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THE BRITISH ACADEMY

The Philistiues
Their Historv and Civilization

R. A. Stewart Macali>tt^r, MA.. F.S.A

(Piofessor at Ceiiic Aicfaaeologj^ Unhreisity G>llri:e. Du.->;-i

Th. f Sr]i ii't nil L c cfures
1911

Wddie banie dex Wdtgeschidite, dass die so wenig * philisteriiaite ' NadoB
in mdiracn Spacben Enropas jefzt ihren Namoi zor Boeichnnng des feigen
uod Isi^w^d^en ^liessbargeis hetgeben mu^ !

W. Max McLixa

- FbilisDiUain ', ar: - " ' ;- --= -':- ~- r~ -- '--.'-- -:^ — - . I order.

London

Published for the Briti?.. -^>..^aciiiv

By Humphrey Milford, Oxford UniversiU* Press

Amen Comer, E.C.

1913

OXFOUD: HORACE HAKT
PIUXTER TO THE UNIVERSITY

PREFACE

Ajioxc the Nations that came uithiu the purview of the Old
Testament AVriters — nations st'ldoni mentioned without stricture,
whether for idolatry, immorality, or cruelty — perhaps none were
the object of so concentrated an aversion as were the Philistines.
The licentiousness of the Amorites, the hard-heartedness of the
Egyptian taskmasters, the fiendish savagery of the Assyrian warriors,
each of these in turn receives its due share of condemnation. But
the scornful judgement passed bv the Hebrews on the IMiilistines has
made a much deej)er impression on the Bible-reading West than have
their fulminations against other races and comnuniities with which
they had to do. In English, from at least the tin)e of Dekker,^ the
word ' Philistine ' has been used in one or other of the senses of the
modern collocjuialism 'outsider'' ; and, especially since the publication
of the essays of Mr. Matthew Arnold, it has become almost a technical
term for a person boorish or bucolic of mind, impervious to the
higher iuHuences of art or of civilization. In French and German —
probably, indeed, in most of the languages of Europc^ — the word is
used in familiar speech with a greater or less aj)proximation to the
same meaning.

The following little book is an attempt to collect in a convenient
form the information so far available about the Philistine people. It
is an expansion of a course of three lectures, delivered in 1911 before
the British Academy under the Schweich Eund. In preparing it
for publication, the matter has been revised and re-written throughout;
and the division into lectures — primarily imposed by the exigencies of
time-allowanct — has been abandoned for a more systematic and con-
venient division into chapters and sections.

It is hoped that the perusal of these pages will at least suggest

' The Xevj EvffHnh D'lcfionary quotes, iiiltr iilia, ' Silke and satten, you mad
Philistines, silke and satten ' (Dckker, KiOO;': 'They say, you went to Court last
Night very drunk; nay, I'm told for certain you had been among- Philistines'
(^Swift, 17;}8) : ' The obtuseness of a mere English Philistine we trust is pardonable'
{The Examiner, 1827): 'Philistinism! we have not the expression in English.
Perhaps we have not the word beeausc we have so much of the thing ' (M. Arnold,
1863) : and the quotation from the (Jnartirhi /.Vr/nr. whieh is printed on the
title-page.

a 'i

iv PREFACE

a doubt .V to the jiistico of" the colliKjuial use of the name of this
ancient people.

As it may he well to j)reserve a reeord of the svllabus of the
original lectures, a copy of it is subjoined.

Lecture 1 (15 Dfcember, 1911). The evil reputation of the Pliilistines. Iteeent
researches and discoveries. A sketch of the development of Cretan civilization.
The Keftiii in the Egyptian records. The sack of Cnossos and subsequent
devek)puients. The * Peoples of the Sea'. Their raid on Egypt. Its repulse.
Recovery of the ' Peoples of the Sea ' from their reverse. The adventures of
Wen-Amon. The earliest reference to the Philistines in the Old Testament.
The Abraham and Isaac stories. The references in the iiistory of the Exodus.
Shamgar. Samson.

Lecture 11 (18 December, 1911;. The domination of the Philistines. The capture
of the Ark and the outbreak of plague. Samuel and Saul. Relative culture of
Philistines and Hebrews during the reign of JSaul. The incidents of David's out-
lawry. Achish, king of Oath. Gilboa. The Philistine domination broken by
David. The various versions of the story of Goliath. The Philistines under the
later monarchy. The Philistines in the Assyrian records. Neheniiah. The
Maccabees. Traditions of the Philistines among the modern peasants of Palestine.
Theories of the origin of the Philistines. Caphtor and the Cherethites.

Lecture 111 (22 December, 1911). The Organization of the Philistines. Their
<'ountry and cities. The problem of the site of Ekron. The language of the
Philistines. Alleged traces of it in Hebrew. Their religion and deities. Their art.
Recent discoveries. The place of the Philistines in History and Civilization.

I have to expi'css my acknowledgements to my friends and col-
leagues, the Kev. 1*. Boylan, Maynooth, and the Jiev. Prof. Henry
Browne, S. J. ; also to the Very Rev. Principal G. A. Smith, Aberdeen,
and Mr. E. II, Alton, of Dublin University, for allowing me to
consult them on various points that arose in the course of this work.
The first and last named have most kindly read through proof-sheets
of the work and have made many valuable suggestions, but they have
no responsibility for any errors that the discerning critic may detect.

The figures on pp. 118, 119 are inserted by permission of the
Society for Promoting Chi'istiaii Knowledge.

R. A. S. M.

DlHLIN,

Neic Year, 1913.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

I'ACK

The Oui(;iK of the Philistines ...... 1

CHAPTER H

The History oe the Phhtstixks ; . . . . . !^9

1. The Adventures of Wen-AnioH union<j thein . . !;Ji)

2. Their Struggle with the Hebrews .... 38

3. Their Decline and Disappearance . . . .62

CHAPTER HI

The Land ok the Philistixes ...... OH

CHAPTER IV

The Culture of the Piiilistixks ...... 79

1. Their Language ........ 71)

2. Their Organization : (A) Political, (B) Military,

3. Their Religion 90

4. Their Place in History and Civilization . . .114

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

i'k;
1.

10.

A Ket'tiau fVoin the Toiiili of Rokliniara and a Cretan fVoni

.Sketcli-map to illustrate tlic IJattle of (u'l)a

Skctcli-niap of IMiilistia . . ...

Tlie Phaestos Disk

Coins of (iaza and Aslikelon .....

'I'lie Charac-ters on the IMiaostos Disk ....

AV^ag'ons of till' l*ula>ati ......

The Head-dress of the I'lihisati

The Sea-Hu-lit Itetneen l{aiiies-u III and tlie Allies

\ Bird, as painted on an .\niorite and a I'hilistine \'ase re>

Sketch-plans and Kle\alion,- of tlie .Mainciou at dn/.n and <i
J'emple .......

Knossos

M.y.
'.)

.V.)

1 1
, }{.-,
]]J.
IK)
]li{
]1»

Hit

]tectively

iiii

1' Soldinon

liU

THE PHILISTINES

THEIR HISTORY AND CIVILIZATION

CHAPTER I

THE ORIGIN OF THE PHILISTINES

The Old Testament history is almost exclusively occupied with
Semitic tribes. Babylonians, Assyrians, Canaanites, Hebrews, Ara-
maeans— all these, however much they might war among themselves,
were bound by close linguistic and other ties, bespeaking a common
origin in the dim, remote recesses of the past. Even the Egyptians
show evident signs of having been at least crossed with a Semitic
strain at some period early in their long and wonderful history. One
people alone, among those brought conspicuously to our notice in the
Hebrew Scriptures, impresses the reader as offering indications of
alien origin. This is the people whom we call ' Philistines \

If we had any clear idea of wliat the word ' Philistine ' meant, or to

what language it originally belonged, it might throw such definite

light upon the beginnings of the Philistine people that further

investigation would be unnecessary. The answer to this question is,

however, a mere matter of guess- work. In the Old Testament the word is

regularly written P^listim (D"'ntrpS), singular P'^listT CWpS), twice ^

P^listiyim (D^'^rip'ps). The territory which they inhabited during the

time of their struggles with the Hebrews is known as 'eres P^listlm

-I ... . . *

(CiyiK^pQ px) ' the Land of Philistines ', or in poetical passages,

simply Peleseth (ri'^pS) 'Philistia'. Josephus regularly calls them

UaXaidTLvoL, except once, in his version of the Table of Nations in

Genesis x (A7it. 1. vi. 2) where we have the genitive singular

^vKiCTTlVOV.

^ In Amos ix. 7 and in the Kethlbh of 1 Chron. xiv. 10. The almost uniform
rendering of the Greek version {^v^taTttifi) seems rather to favour this orthography.
The spelling of the first syllable, ^v, shows, however, that the modern pvinctuation
with the shva is of later growth, and that in the time of the Greek translation the
pronunciation still approximated rather to the form of the name as it appears in
Egyptian monuments (Purasati).

2 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

Various coiijcctiires as to the etymology of this name have been put
foiMvarfl from time to time. One of the oldest, that ajjparently due
to Fourniont,^ connects it with the traditional Greek name UiXarryoL;
an equation which, however, does no more than move the problem of
oii<rin one step further back. This theory was adopted by Ilitzig,
the author of the first book in modern times on the Philistines, ^
who connected the word with Sanskrit valaksa ' white \ and made
other similar comparisons, as for instance between the name of
the deity of Gaza, Mama, and the Indian Variina. On the other
hand a Si'mitic etymology was sought bv Gesenius,"^ Movers,'* and
others, who quoted an Ethiopic verb falasa^ ' to wander, roam,'
wlience comes the %nhsii\nt\\ c falh'isi, 'a stranger.' In this etvmology
they Avere anticipated by the translators of the Greek Aversion, who
habitually render the name of the Philistines by the Greek word
o.\X(j(I)v\ol/' even when it is put into the mouths of Goliath or Achish,
when speaking of themselves. Of course this is merely an etymological
speculation on the part of the translators, and pi'oves nothing more than
the existence of a Hebrew root (otherwise apparently unattested)
similar in form and meaning to the Ethiopic root cited. And quite
apart from any questions of linguistic probabilitv, there is an obvious
logical objection to such an etymologv. In the course of the following
pages we shall find the court scribes of Ramessu III, the historians of
Israel, and the keepers of the records of the kings of Assyria, agreeing
in applying the same name to the nation in question. These three
groups of writers, belonging to as many separate nations and epochs
of time, no doubt worked independently of each other — most probably
in ignorance of each other's productions. This being so, it follows
almost conclusively that the name ' Philistine ' nuist have been derived
from Philistine sources, and in short must have been the native
designation. Now a word meaning 'stranger' or the like, while it
might well be applied by foreigners to a nation deemed by them

' Itt'-flexifms critiques srir Voric/ine, Vlmtoire et la succession des nnciens peuples
(1747, ii. 2rA.

' F. Hitzifr, Viyfesrhichteund Mythologie der PhiUster, Leipzig, 184.5.

' Gesenius, Thesaurus, s. v.

* Movers, Untersuchungen iiber die Relit/ion und die Oottheiten der Phonizier (1841),
vol. i, p. 9.

Kxcept (ay in the Hexateuc-h, where it is always transliterated ^vKiaruifi, some-
times 4>v\taTuix or -PtKiTTiftfji; (h) in Judges x. 6, 7, 11. xiii. 1, .5, xiv. 2, where again
we find the word transliterated : in some important MSS. liowever, including Codex
Alexandrinus, d\\ij(),v\oi is used in these passages; (c) in Isa. ix. 11 (English
i X. 12, where we find the curious rendering "FAXjyms, possibly indicating a variant
reading in the text that lay before the translators.

THE OUKilN OF TIIK IMIILISTINKS 3

intriulcrs, would scaict-lv hv ;u]()j)tc'(l 1)V the nation itself, as its chosen
ethnic appellation. This Ethiopic comparison it seems tlierefore safe to
reject. The fantasy that Reclsloh ' puts forward, namely, that ntJ'?D
'Pliilistia' was an anagram for rht\^, tiie Shcphclali or foot-hills of
Judea, is perhaps best forgotten : place-names do not as a rule come
to be in this mechanical way, and in any case ' the Shephelah ' and
' Philistia"* were not geographically identical.

There is a peculiarity in the designation of the I'liilistines in
Hebrew which has often been noticed, and which must ha\e a
certain significance. In referring to a tribe or nation the Hel)rcw
writers as a rule either («) personified an imaginary founder, making
his name stand for the tribe supposed to derive from him —
e. g. ' Israel ' for the Israelites ; or (6) used the tribal name in the
singular^ with the definite article — a usage sometimes transferred to
the Authorized \'ersion, as in such familiar phrases as ' the Canaanite
was then in the land' (Gen. xii. 6) ; but more connnonly assimilated
to the English idiom which re{(uires a plural, as in 'the iniquity of
the Amorite[s] is not yet fulP (Gen. xv. 16). But in referring to the
Philistines, the phiral of the ethnic name is always used, and as a rule
the definite article is omitted. A good example is afforded by the
name of the Philistine territory above mentioned, eres P'listnn,
literally ' the land of Philistines "* : contrast such an expression as
'eres hak- K^na'anl, literally 'the land of the Canaanite'. A few
other names, such as that of the Rephahn, are similarly constructed :
and so far as the scanty monuments of Classical Hebrew permit us to
judge, it may be said generally that the same usage seems to be
followed when there is question of a people not conforming to the
model of Semitic (or perhaps we should rather say Aramaean) tribal
organization. The Canaanites, Amorites, Jcbusites, and the rest, are
so closely bound together by the theory of blood-kinship which even
yet prevails in the Arabian deserts, that each may logically be spoken
of as an individiial human unit. No such ])olity was recognized
among the pre-Semitic Rephaim, or the intruding Philistines, so
that they had to be referred to as an aggregate of human units.
This rule, it must be admitted, does not seem to be rigidly main-
tained ; for instance, the name of the pre-Semitic Horites might
have been expected to follow the exceptional construction. But
a hard-and-fast adhesion to so subtle a distinction, by all the writers
who have contributed to the canon of the Hebrew scriptures and by

^ Die alttest. Xamen thr Berulktrun;/, p. 4; adopted by Arnold in Erscli and
Gruber's Encyclopaedia, s. v. I'liilinter.

4 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

all the scribes who have transmitted their works, is not to be
expected. Even in the case of the Philistines the rule that the
definite article should be omitted is broken in eleven places.^

However, this distinction, which in the case of the Philistines is
carefully observed (with the exceptions cited in the footnote), indicates
at the outset that the Philistines were regarded as something apart
from the ordinary Semitic tribes with whom the Hebrews had to do.

The name of the Philistines, therefore, does not lead us very far in
our examination of the origin of this people. Our next step must be
to in(]uire what traditions the Hebrews preserved respecting the
origin of their hereditary enemies ; though such evidence on a
(luestion of historical truth must obviously even under the most
favourable circumstances be unsatisfactory.

The locus classicus is, of course, the table of nations in Genesis x.
Here we read (vv. 6, 13, 14), 'And the sons of Plam : Cush, and
Mizraim, and Put, and Canaan . . . And Mizraim begat Ludim, and
'Anamim, and Lehabim, and Naphtuhim, and Pathrusim, and
Casluhim (whence went forth the Philistines) and Caphtorim.'' The
list of the sons of Ham is assigned to the Priestly source ; that of the
sons of Mizraim (distinguished by the formula ' he begat ') to the
Yahvistic source. The ethnical names are almost all problematical,
and the part of special interest to us has been affected, it is
supposed, by a disturbance of the text.

So far as the names can be identified at all, the passage means that
in the view of the writer or writers who compiled the table of nations,
the Hamitic or southern group of mankind were Ethiopia, Egypt,
^ I'uf, and Canaan. Into the dis])uted question of the identification
of the third of these, this is not the place to enter. Passing over the
children assigned to Cush or Ethiopia, we come to the list of peo})les
supposed by the Yahvist to be derived from Egypt. Who or what
most of these peoples were is very uncertain. The Ludim are supposed
to have been Libyans (d in the name being looked upon as an error
for b) ; the Lehabim are also supposed to be Libyans ; the 'Anamim
are unknown, as are also the Casluhim ; but the Naphtuhim and
Pathrusim seem to be reasonably identified with the inhabitants of
Lower and Upper Egypt respectively. -

' Xaiiicly Josluia xiii. 2; 1 Sam. iv. 7, vii. 12, xiii. 20, xvii. 51, 52; 2 Sam. v. 19,
xxi. 12, 17 ; 1 C'hron. xi. 13 ; 2 Chron. xxi. Ki.

'^ For fuller particulars see Skinner's Commentary on Genent.i (pp. 200-214).
Sayce finds CapJitor and Kasluhet on an inscription at Kom Onibo : sec Hastings's
Dictionary, s. v. Caphtor ; and Man, 19U3, No. 77. But see also Hall's criticisms,
ib. No. 92.

THE ORIGIN OF TIIK rillLISTINES 5

There remain the Caphtor'nii, and the interjected note ' whence
went forth the Thilistines'. The latter has every appearance of
having originally been a marginal gloss that has crept into the text.
And in the liglit of other passages, presently to be cited, it would
appear that the gloss referred originally not to the unknowii Casluhini,
but to the Caphtorini. It must, however, be said that all the versions,
as well as the first chapter of Chronicles, agree in the reading of the
received text, though emendation Avould seem obviously called for.
This shows us either that the disturbance of the text is of great anti-
quity, or else that the received text is, after all, ccn-rect, and that the
Casluhini are to be considered a branch of, or at anv rate a tribe
nearly related to, the Caphtorini.

The connexion of the Philistines with a place called Caphtor is
definitelv stated in Anios ix. 7 : ' Have not I brought up Israel out
of the land of Egv])t, and the PhUlst'mcs from Caphtor^ and the
Syrians from Kir.'"* It is repeated in Jeremiah xlvii. 4, where the
Philistines are referred to as ' the remnant of the "i of Caj)htor \ The
word ""i is rendered in the Revised Version ' island ', with marginal
rendering 'sea coast "* : this alternative well expresses the ambiguity in
the meaning of the word, which does not permit us to assume that
Caphtor, as indicated by Jeremiah, was necessarily one of the islands
of the sea. Indeed, even if the word definitely meant ' island ', its
use here would not be altogether conclusive on this point : an isolated
headland might long pass for an island among primitive navigators,
and therefore such a casual mention need not limit our search for
Caphtor to an actual island.

Again, in Deuteronomy ii. 23, certain peoj)le called the Caphtorini,
' which came out of Caphtor ', are mentioned as having destroyed the
'Avvim that dwelt in villages as far as Gaza, and established them-
selves in their stead. The geographical indication shows that the
Caphtorini must be identified, generally sjjeaking, with the Philistines :
the passage is valuable as a record of the name of the earlier in-
habitants, who, however, were not utterly destroyed : they remained
in the south of the Philistine territory (Josluia xiii. 4).

The question of the identification of Caphtor must, however, be
postponed till we have noted the other ethnic indications which the
Hebrew scriptures preserve. Chief of these is the application of the
word C^rethl ('01?) ' Cherethites ' to this people or to a branch of
them.

Thus in 1 Samuel xxx. 14 the young Egyptian servant, describing
the Amalekite raid, said ' we raided the south of the Cherethites and

6 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

the property of Judali and the south of the Calebites and ])urnt
Ziklag with fire \ In Ezekiel xxv, 1 6 the Phihstines and the Cherethites
with 'the renniant of the sea-coast' are closely bound together in
a common denunciation, which we find practically repeated in the
important passage Zephaniah ii. 5, where a woe is pronounced on the
dwellers by the sea-coast, the nation of the Cherethites, and on
'Canaan, the land of the Philistines'; this latter is a noteworthy
expression, probably, however, interpolated in the text. In both these
last passages the Greek version renders this word Kpym ' Cretans ' ;
elsewhere it simply transliterates [XeKeOi, with many varieties of
spelling).^

In both places it would appear that the name 'Cherethites"* is
chosen for the sake of a paronomasia (mD = ' to cut off "'). In the
obscure expression ' children of the land of the covenant ' (rT'ian I'ls "ija
Ezek. XXX. 5) some commentators - see a corruption of Tnnn ''J3
' Children of the Cherethites'. But see the note, p. 123 poii.

In other places the Cherethites are alluded to as part of the
bodyguard of the early Hebrew kings, and are coupled invariably
with the name Ti.^^ Pelethites. This is probably merely a modifica-
tion of Ticva, the ordinary word for 'Philistine', the letter s being
omitted in order to produce an assonance between the two names.^
The Semites are fond of such assonances : they are not infrequent
in modern Arab speech, and such a combination as Shupplm and
Hup pi m (1 Chron, vii. 12) shows that they are to be looked for
in older Semitic writings as well. If this old explanation ^ be not
accepted, we should have to put the word ' Pelethites ' aside as hope-
lessly unintelligible. Herodotus's Philitis, or Philition, a shepherd
after whom the Egyptians were alleged to call the Pyramids,^ has
often been quoted in connexion with this name, coupled with baseless
speculations as to whether the Philistines could have been the Hyksos.

1 Such are Xappt, XapfOOi, XeXOi, XeXOti, X(X$t, XiX^ei, XtX^ts, XfXtna, XtXteOi,
XfXXfOij XfXfOit, XfXfOdt, X(Xo69t, XoXOti, XoXX(0i, XnpeOt, Xopf60(t, Xoppt, Xoppti,
XfptOfi, \(pTj6(t, XfptT, Xfp(66et, XtpiOiv, Xtptoi, Xojpi, Xfp-qO-q. XtprjOti, X(t9(i, Xerrfi,
Oxf>^f6&t, OxfptT^', OxfA/3(, Ox«A^i. Ox<Af9, P(69i. The Pelethites appear under
equally strange guises: «J>«A.«ti, ^(Xrt, ^fXrti, ^eXeTu, ieXeTTti, 'tfXeOdi, ^tXtOOti,
^iXtOen, -PeXfTOft, ^(XtXteOi, Ovim, Oxer, OcpeXrt, OffXOi, 0<p(Xfeeu, OipiXtTOtL,
n<pfXfeeu. O-ntXet, OntXtOLV, OntpfT, ntX(l3i, OOtGu, XtTTmo?.

- Cornill, JJds linrh des I'roph. Ih'k. p. lUiH, followed by To3% Ezekiel (in Sacred
Books ofO.T.), p. 8S.

" Possibly the instinct for trilitcralism may also liave been instrumental in the
evolution of this form.

* It is given in Lakemacher, Ohserrntinnis PluloUxiirna (1729), ii. 38, and revived
by Ewald in his Knlisrlip drammatik tier hiliriiisrluv Sjimrhe ,1827), j). 297.

"' Hdt. ii. 12H.

THE ORIGIN OF THE ITIILISTINES 7

With regard to the syntax of these two names, it is to be noticed
that as a rule they coiitonn to the ordinary Hebrew usage, contrary
perhaps to what we might have expected. Ikit in the two prophetic
passages we have quoted, the name of the Cherethites agrees in
construction witli that of the Phihstines.

In three passages — 2 Samuel xx. 23, 2 Kings xi. 4, 19 — the name
of the royal body-guard of 'Cherethites'' appears as '1? ' Carians \
If this happened only once it might be purely accidental, due to
the dropping of a n by a copyist ; Ijut being confirmed by its three-
fold repetition, it is a fact that must be noted carefully ^ for future
reference.

Here the Hebrew records leave us, and we must seek elsewhere
for further light. Thanks to the discoveries of recent years, our
search need not be prolonged. For in the Egyptian records we find
mention of a region whose name, Keftw, has an arresting similarity
to the 'Caphtor*" of Hebrew writers. It is not immediately obvious
whence comes the final r of the latter, if the comparison be sound ;
but waiving this cjuestion for a moment, let us see what is to be
made of the Egyptian name, and, above all, what indications as to its
precise situation are to be gleaned from the Egyptian monuments.

The name k-f-tiw (^^^^ [^1^::^:^ 1 sometimes written k-f-ty-w

I \ v\ r^^"^) first meets us on Egyptian monuments of the

Eighteenth Dynasty. It is apparently an Egyptian word : at least,
it is capable of being rendered ' behind \ and assuming this rendering
Mr. H. R. Hall ^ aptly compares it with our colloquialism ' the Back
of Beyond \ Unless this is to be put aside as a mere Volksetyviologie,
it clearly w^ould be useless to search the maps of classical atlases for
any name resembling Keftiu. It would simjily indicate that the
Egyptians had a sense of remoteness or uncertainty about the position
of the country ; and even from this we could tlerive no help, for as
a rule they manifest a similar vagueness about other foreign places.

It is specifically under Thutmose HI that 'Keftiu' first appears
as the name of a place or a people On the great stele in the Cairo
Museum in which the king's mighty deeds are summarized, in the
form of a Hymn to Anion, we read ' I came and caused thee to smite

the west-land, and the land of Keftiu and Asi ( (I "TT" (I (1 Ci:^:^ j

1 The Greek version has XtpfSi in the first of these passages, in the others Xoppi
with a number of varieties of speUing, 'Xoppu, Xopif, &c., all of them showing o as
the first vowel.

2 Journal of the British School at Athens, viii (1901-2;, p. 1.57.

8 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

are terrified'. In the Annalistic Inscnptioii on the walls of the
Temple of Karnak the name appears in interesting connexion with
maritime enterprise. ' The harbours of the king were supplied
with all the good things which he received in Syria, namely ships
of Keftiu, Byblos, and Sektu [the last-named place is not identified],
cedar-ships laden with poles and masts.' 'A silver vessel of Keftiu
work ' was part of the tribute paid to Thutmose by a certain chief-
tain.^ Keftiu itself does not send any tribute recorded in the annals ;
but tribute from the associated land of Asi is enumerated, in which
c()j)per is the most conspicuous item. This in itself proves nothing,
for the copper might in the first instance have been brought to Asi
from somewhere else, before it passed into the coffers of the all-
devouring Pharaoh : but on the Tell el-Amarna tablets a copper-
prodttcing country, with the similar name Alasia, is prominent, and
as Cyprus was the chief if not the only source of copper in the
Eastern Mediterranean, the balance of probability seems to be in
favour of equating Asi and Alasia alike to Cyprus. In this case
Keftiu would denote some place, generally speaking, in the neighbour-
hood of Cyprus.

The next important sources of information are the wall-paintings
in the famous tombs of Sen-nuit, architect to Queen Hatshepsut ;
of Rekhmara, vizier of Thutmose HI; and of Menkheperuseneb, son
of the last-named official," high priest of Anion and royal treasurer.
In these wall-paintings we see processions of })crsons, with non-Semitic
European-looking fiices ; attired simplv in highly embroidered loin-
cloths folded round their singularly slender waists, and in high boots
or gaiters; with hair dressed in a distinctly non-Semitic manner;
bearing vessels and other objects of certain definite types. The
tomb of Sen-mut is much injured, but the Cretan ornaments there
drawn are unmistakable. In the tomb of Rekhmara we see the
official standing, with five rows of foreigners carrying their gifts,
a scribe recording the inventory at the head of each row, and an
inscription explaining the scene as the ' Reception by the hereditary
jjrince Rekhmara of the tribute of the south countrv, with the

^ Tlie name of tliis chicnain's land is luulilated fj/ii'i/). Mr. Hall o]). cit. p. 167,
Oldext Civi/imtiun of (h-eicf, p. 1()3) restores Ynntdnmj, and renders 'Cyprus'.
W. Max Miiller compares with this name the word Adhmi, found in the List of
Keftiaii names friven on j). 10.

^ For these tombs see Hall, Jlrifis/i Srlmol (it J/liins, vol. x (1903-4), p. loi. and
I'roc. Sor. Jilh. Arch, xxxi, Plate XVI [Scn-mut| ; Wilkinson, Manners and Cnntums
of the Anchiil K<iyptinn.t, i, Plate H, A.li. IKekhmaraJ; Virey, Mimoires df la
inigs'uin in C<iirc, v, p. 7 I^Kckliiiiara ', j). 1!»7 ff Menkheperuseneb"'. In the last-
named, Keftiu is translated and indexed ' Phenicie \

THE OltlGIN OF rilE PHILISTINES

tribute of I'lmt, the tribute of Keteuu, tlie tril)ute of Keftiii, besides
the booty of all nations brout^ht by the fame of Thutniose III\ In
the tomb of Menkheperuseneb there are again two lines of tribute-
bearers, described as 'the chief of Keftiu, the chief of Kheta, the
chief of Tunip, the chief of Kadesh"'; and an inscription asserts that
these various chiefs are praising the ruler of the Two Lands, cele-
brating his victories, and bringing on their backs silver, gold, la|)is
lazuli, n)alachite, and all kinds of precious stones.

Fig. 1. A. A Koftiaii from tlic Tonil* of Rekliinara.
u. A Cretan from Knossos.

Some minor examples, confirming the conclusions to which these three
outstanding tomb-frescoes point, will be found in W. Max Miiller's
important paper, Neue Darstelhingcn ^ viulccnlschcr'' Gc.sandter . . . in
altagyptischen WandgemaJden (Mitt. vorderas.-Gesell,, 1904, No. 2).

Kecent investigations in the island of Crete have enabled us to
identify with certainty the sources of the civilization which these
messengers and their gifts represent. Wall-j^aintings have there been
found representing people witii the same facial type, the same costume,
the same methods of dressing the hair ; and as it were the orifjinals of
the costly vases they bear have been found in such profusion as to
leave no doubt that they are there on their native soil. The messengers,
who are depicted in the Egyptian frescoes, are introducing into Egypt

10 THE SCHAVEICH LECTURES, 1911

some of the chcfs-d'ditvrc of Cretan art ; specifically, art of the
periods known as Eate Minoan I and 11,^ the time of the greatest
glorv of the palace of Knossos ; and as they are definitely described in
the accompanying hieroglyphs as messengers of Keftiu, it follows that
Keftiu was at least a centre of distrilnition of the products of Cretan
civiHzation, and therefore a place under the infiuence of Crete, if
it was not actually the island of Crete itself. And the clear evidence,
that excavation in Crete has revealed, of a back-wash of Egyptian
influence on Cretan civilization at the time of the coming to Egypt
of the Keftian envoys, turns the probability into as near a certainty
as it is at present possible to attain.

The next document to be noticed is a hieratic school exercise-tablet,
apparently (to judge from the forms of the script) dating from the end
of the Eighteenth Dynasty. It is now preserved in the British Museum,
numbered 5647.- On the one side are some random scribbles, like
the meaningless words and phrases with which one tries a doubtful
pen :

* The goddess Ubast — they are small, numerous — of precious things,
when — his majesty was seen, as he turned his fece there was — for the
feast day, one jar of wine [this line repeated] — Ru-unti — Ru-dadama
— Smdt-ty ' [three names].

On the other side is

' To make names of Keftiu : •

Asahurau

Nasuy

Akasou

Adinai

Pinaruta

Rusa

Sen-Nofer [an Egyptian name, twice repeated]

Akasou
"a hundred of copper, fl/i7///-axes "" [reading uncertain]

Benesasira
[two illegible names]

Sen-nofer

Sumrssu [Egyptian] ''

Though the reading of some of the items of this list is not quite
certain, it seems clear that the heading 'irt rn n keftw, 'to make
names of Keftiu', indicates that this tablet is a note of names to be used

' See tlie l)ricf suiimiary of the vurioiis stages of Cretan culture during the
Bronze Age, l;iter in the present chapter.

* See Spiegelberg, Ze'ttsrlmfl fiir ^lum/riDloi/ie {18Q3), viii. 38.5 (where the text is
puhhshed incompletely), and \V. Max Miiller in MittJieihnigen der vorderaxiatischen
Gesf.lUrhdfl, vol. v, |). (j, where facsimiles will be found.

THE ORIGIN OF THE PHILISTINES 11

in some exercise or essay. The presence of the laniiliur IMiilistine name
Achish, in the form Akason, twice over, is suggestive, but otherwise
the tablet does not help forward our present incpiiiT into the position
of Keftiu and the origin of the Thilistine people.

These various discoveries of recent years inake it unnecessarv to dis-
cuss at any length other theories which have been presented in ancient
and modern times as to the identification of the name of Keftiu or of
Caphtor. The Ptolemaic Jonathan Oldbuck who translated for his
master the Decree of Canopus into Hieroglyphics, revived this ancient
geographical name to translate <\^0LVLKr]s : a piece of irresponsible
pedantry which has caused nothing but confusion. Even Ijcfore the dis-
coveries of the last fifteen or twenty years it was obvious that the
Keftiu of Rekhmara's tomb were as unlike Phoenicians as tiiev could
possibly be ; and their gifts were also incompatible with what was
known of Phoenician civilization. Endless trouble was thus <>iven to
would-be harmonists. Another antiquary of the same kind and of the
same period, who drew up the inscription to be cut on the temple at
Kom Ombo, has likewise made illegitimate use of the name in ques-
tion. A catalogue of the places con(piered by the founder of the
temple, after the manner of the records of achievements of the great
kings of the Eighteenth Dynasty, was de r'lgueiii- : so the obsequious
scribe set down, apparently at random, a list of any geographical
names that happened to come into his head. Among these is kptar,
the final r of which seems to denote a Hebrew source ; perhaps he
learnt the name from some brother antiquary in the neighbouring
Jewish colony at Aswan.

The Greek translators of the scriptures, the Peshitta, and the
Targums, in Deuteronomy ii. 23, Amos ix. 7, render the name Cappa-
docia. This seems to be merely a guess, founded on similarity of sound.

In modern times, even before the days of scientific archaeology,
the equation of Caphtor to Crete has always been the theory most
in favour. Apart from Jeremiah's description of the place as an
' island ' — which as we have already mentioned is not quite con-
clusive — the obvious equation Cherethites = Cretans would strike
any student. Calmet ^ gives a good statement of the arguments
for the identification which were available before the age of exca-
vation.

For completeness"" sake we may refer here to various other theories
of Philistine origin which have been put forward by modern
scholars : it is, however, not necessary to give full references

^ Dissertations (jui j)enven( sei'vir de vrolegomines de Vtrriture sninte (ITJO, II. ii,
p. 441.

12 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

to all the writers who have considered the question. The favourite
hypothesis anion^ those who rejected the Caphtor-Crete identifica-
tion was founded on the Greek Version and Jose])hus : Caphtor was
by them identified with Cappadocia, and Casluhiui with the Colchians.
Hit/ig', as stated earlier in this chapter, identified them with the
]'elasgians, who came, according to his view, fi-om Crete to North
Egypt, identified with the Casluhim of the Table of Nations : their
language he supposed to be cognate with Sanskrit, and by Sanskrit he
interpreted many of the names of people and places. Quatremere,
reviewing Hitzig's l)ook in the Journal des Savants (1846, pp. 257,
411), suggested a rival theory, deri\ing them from AVest Africa,
equating Casluhim with Sheluh, a sept of the Berbers. Stark
{Gaza, p. 70) assigned them to the Phoenicians, accepting the South
Semitic etymology of the name Pelistim, Caphtor being the Delta,
and Casluhim a name cognate with the Kasios mountain, denoting
a tribe living between Kasios and Pelusium.^ Kohler - had a compli-
cated theory to reconcile all the various lines of Biblical evidence : he
took Caphtor to be the Delta ; the Philistines springing from there
settled in Casluhim (between Casios and Pelusium) : 'going forth'
from Casluhim they sailed to Crete, and then returned to Philistia.
Knobel {Die Volkertafel der Genesis, p. 215 sqq.) proposed a double
origin for the Philistine people. The main body he took to be
Senates who came out (geographically, not racially) from the Casluhim
in North Egypt ; and the Caphtorim were a southern tribe of Cretan or
Carian origin. Knobel gave a very careful analysis of the evidence
available at his time, but he overlooked the Medinet Habu sculptures,
and, on the other hand, gave too much weight to the gossip of
Herodotus about Philitis and the Pyramids.

Ebers ^ made an elaborate attempt to find in the Delta a site
for Ca])htor ; but this can hardly stand against later discoveries.
They are no goods from the Land of Goshen which Rekhmara's
visitors are carrying. W. Max INIiiller'* equates Keftiu to Cilicia,
mainly on the ground of the order in which the name occurs in
geographical lists : but though this is not an argument to be
lightly set aside, we are confronted with the difficulty that Cilicia
could hardly have been a centre of distribution of Minoan ijoods
in the time of Rekhmara.''

' .\ place which, as has often been noticed, has the same radicals as the name of
the Philistines.

* Lehrhnrh d. liihi. Genrliirhte, vol. i.

' Aer/i/ijfeii und dan JJiuh Moxc, p. 1^7 ff. * .A.iUn itnd Eiiropa, p. 3;}7.

" An elaborate refutation of the Cilician hypotlie.sis will hv found in Noordtzij,
Jje Filintljnf-H, j). 34-.

THE ORIGIN OF THE PHILISTINES 13

Schwally ^ argues thus for the Semitic origin of the Philistines :
that if the Phihstines were immigrants, so were the Phoenicians and
Syrians {teste Amos) : that the identity of Caphtor and Crete is an
unproved assumption : the Greek translation twice renders ' Chere-
thites ' by ' Cretans', it is true, but not elsewhere, showing uncertainty
on the subject: and the reading 'Crete ' in Zephaniah ii. 6 is wrong. All
the personal names, and all the place-names (except possibly El-tekeh
and Ziklag)are Semitic, and there is no trace of any non-Semitic deity.
Stade - asserts the Semitic origin of the people, without giving any
very definite proofs ; Tiele ^ claims the Philistines as Semites on the
ground of their Semitic worship. Beecher (in Hastings's Diet, of the
Bible, s. V. Philistines) claims the name of the people as ' probably
Semitic', but considers that most likely they were originally Aryan
pirates who had become completely Semitized. The non-circumcision
of the Philistines is a difficulty against assigning to them a Semitic
origin ; and the vai-ious Semitic elements in their names, religion,
and language can most reasonably be explained by borrowing — pre-
sumably as a result of free intermarriage with Semites or Semitized
aborigines.

On the other hand, it may be said at once that it is perhaps a little
premature to call them Aryans. On the whole, the probability seems
to be against the Philistine being an Aryan tongue — it certainly was
not, if (as is not unlikely) it had affinities with Etruscan.

But these identifications are to a large extent the personal
opinions of those who put them forward. The identification of
Caphtor and Keftiu \\ith Crete is so generally accepted, that there
is a danger that some difficulties in the way should be overlooked.
For first of all we are met with a question of philology : whence
came the final r in the Hebrew word 'f It has been suggested that
it might be a nominative suflRx of the Keftian language. It would
in any case be more probably a locative or prepositional suffix : for place-
names are apt to get taken over into foreign languages in one or
other of those cases, because they are generally referred to in con-
texts that require them ; just as Eriu, the old Irish name of Ireland,
has been taken over into English in its prepositional case, now spelt
Erin. It might possibly be a plural : Mr. Alton has suggested to me a
comparison with the Etruscan plural ending er, ar, in: Letting the
question of the exact case pass, however, as irrelevant, there are two
points that must be indicated regarding the suggestion that r is

' Zeitschr. fib- xoissensch. Theologie, xxxiv (1891), p. 103.

* Oesch. des Volk. Isr. i. 142.

3 Geschiedenu van den Godsdienst in de Oudheid, i. pp. -211, 241.

14 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

a Keftian case-ending. In the first place, it assumes that Keftiu
is, after all, not the EgT[)tian word it resembles, but the native
' Keftian ' name for the place in (j[uestion : it is incompatible with
the ' Back of Beyond ' theory of the meaning of the name. In the
second place, it is difficult to understand how the Hebrews should
have picked up a * Keftian ' case-ending or any such granniiatical
formative, rather than the Egyptians ; for the Egyptians were
brought into direct contact with Keftians, while the Hebrews
arrived on the scene too late to enjoy that advantage. Ebers
attempted to solve the difficulty by su[)posing the r to come from
the Egyptian adjective ioi\ ' great ', tacked on to the place-name.
jNIax Miiller (Asien und Eitropa, p. 390) and Wiedemann (Orient.
LHteraturzeitimg, xiii, col. 49) point out that there is no monumental
evidence for such an expression, and that in any case ' Great Keft-
land' would be Kcft-'a, not Keft-ecr. The latter (loc. cit.) has
an ingenious solution : in an astronomical text in the grave of
Ramessu VI occurs a list of places 'iwnr.r (the land of the Amorites)

])b (unidentified) and ^ v\ (? f^-^"^ kfthr ('Upper Kefti"*).

'Caphtor', he suggests, may be a corruption of this latter expression.
The hypothesis may be noted in passing, though perhaps it is not
altogether convincinir.

Behind this problem lies another, perhaps equally difficult : why
did the Hebrews call the home-land of the Philistines by this name,
which even in Egypt was already obsolete .^

To this question the only reasonable answer that seems to present
itself is to the effect that by the time of the Hebrews Crete or Keftiu
had, with its gorgeous palaces, passed into tradition. Like the
I Breasail or Avallon of Celtic tradition, the ))lace which the Hebrew
writers called ' Caphtor ' was no longer a tangible country, but a
dreamland of folklore, the legends of which had ])robably filtered
into Palestine from Egypt itself. Whether Caphtor was or was
not the same as the island of Crete was to the ancient Hebrew
historian a question of secondary interest beside the all-important
practical fact that the Piiilistines were obstinate in their occupation
of the most desirable jjarts of the Promised Ivand. When the in-
spired herdsman of Tekoa spoke of the Philistines being led from
Caphtor, he was probably just as unconscious of the requirements
of the scientific historian as a modern herdsman who told me that
a certain ancient monument on a Palestinian hill-slope belonged ' to
the time of the Itunr. He no doubt believed what he said: but
^\ ho ())• what the I{um may have ])een, or how many years or centuries

THE ORIGIN OF THE PHILISTINES 15

or geological aeons ago they may have flourished, he neither knew
nor cared.

All, then, that the Hebrews can tell us about their hereditary
enemies is, that they came from a vague traditional place called
Caphtor — a place by the sea, but of which they have nothing more
to say. The tradition of Caphtor seems to be a tradition of the
historical glories of Crete, so far as the Egyptians knew of them, and
the name seems to be a tradition of the name which, for some reason
not certainly known, the Egyptians applied to the source of the
desirable treasures of the Cretan civilization.

Even down to late times the tradition linking Philistia with
Crete persisted in one form or another. Tacitus heard it, though in
a distorted form : in the oft-quoted passage Hist. v. 2 he confuses
the Jews with the Philistines, and makes the former the Cretan
refugees.^ M E I N fl, Minos, is named on some of the coins of Ga/a.
This town was called by the name Mhioa: and its god Mania was
equated to ' Zeus the Crete-born.' ^

But did the Philistines come from Crete .^ That is the question
which we must now consider.

The last generation saw the labours of Schliemann at Troy and
elsewhere, and was startled by the discovery of the splendid pre-
Hellenic civilization of Mycenae. For us has been reserved the yet
greater surprise of finding that this Mycenaean age was but the latest,
indeed the degenerate phase of a vastly older and higher culture. Of
this ancient civilization Crete was the centre and the apex.

The course of civilization in this island, from the end of the
Neolithic period onwards, is divided by Sir Arthur Evans into three
periods ^ which he has named Early, INIiddle, and Late ' IMinoan '
respectively, after the name of ]\Iinos the famous legendary Cretan
king. Each of these three periods is further divided into subordinate

1 'ludaeos Creta Insula profugos nouissima Libyae insedisse memorant, qua
tempestate Saturnus ui louis pulsus cesserit regnis.'

^ Stephanus of Byzantium, s. v. Va^u, it6\is ^oiv'iK-qs, vw 5e UaXaiarlvr^s tt/jo t^j
At7V7rroi;. kicXrjer) Koi "A(,a [nfj?]* icai /xfxp^ ''vu 'S.vpoi " ^iav avrfju KaKovatv, aTri'A^Wos
Tov TraiSos 'RpanXfovs. ^ivOoKoyovai 5e rices dnu Atos icTiadrtvai Kal iv aiiTrj airoKiiriiv t^jv
ISiav Td^av ovtoj tuv Ylfpawi' rd XPW"'''" KaKovvTOJV. Kal fieivdaT]^ avr^s tKti (kXtjOt] St
Kal Mivuia, on Mi'j/ojs (TW roh dSeXipois hlaK^ Kal "PabajxdvQii Iwv f^ avTOv ravrr^v iKaXfOiv.
(v6ev Kal to tov KprjTaiov A(Oj -nap avToTs dvat 6 Kal KaO' Tjfxds fKaXovv Mapvav tpurjvtvu-
fifvov KprjTayevrj. Tas iTapOivovi ydp ovtoj Kp^res irpoaayopfvovffi Mnpimi'.

3 The bare outline statement, which is all that is necessary here, can be supple-
mented by reference to any of the numerous books that have appeared recently on
the special subject of Cretan excavation : such as Professor Burrows's pleasantly
written work entitled The Discoveries in Crete (London, Murray, 1907), which con-
tains a most useful bibliography.

16 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

periods, indicated by numbers ; thus we have Early Minoan I, II, III,
and so for the others. The general characters of these nine periods
mav now be brietiv stated, with the approximate dates which Egyptian
synchronisms enable us to assign.

Into the question of the origin of the early inhabitants of Crete we
need not enter. That there was some connexion between Crete and
Egypt in their stone-age beginnings seems on various grounds to be
not improbable.^ The neolithic Cretan artists were much like
neolithic artists elsewhere. They never succeeded in attaining a very
high position among workers in Hint ; Crete has so far produced
nothing comparable with the best work of the Egyptians and the
Scandinavians. Their pottery was decorated with incised or pricked
patterns filled in with white powdered gypsum, to make a white pat-
tern on a black ground.

The Early Minoan I period inherited this type of ornament and
ware from its predecessors, but improved it. Coloured decoration
now ])egan to be used, the old incised ornaments being imitated with
a wash of paint. The ornament was restricted to simple geometrical
patterns such as zigzags. The pottery was made without the wheel.
In this period short triangular daggers in copper are found. In
Earhj Minoan II the designs are more free and graceful : simple
curves appear, side by side with straight lines, towards the end of
the period. The potter's wheel is introduced. Rude and primitive
idols in marble, alabaster, and steatite are found. The copper
dai^i^ers are likewise found, but the use of flint and obsidian is not
yet wholly abandoned. In Early Minoan III there is not much
advance in the art of the potter. We now, however, begin to find
seals with a kind of hieroglyphic signs upon them, apparently imitated
(in manner if not in matter) from Egyptian seals. These seem to
give us the germ of the art of writing, as practised later in Crete.
Scholars differ (between 2000 and 3000 n. c.)as to the proper date
to assign to the end of tlie Early jMinoan civilization : for our present
purpose it is not important to discuss the causes of disagreement, or
to attempt to decide between tliese conflicting theories.

The next period. Middle Minoan /, takes a great step forward.
We now begin to find polycln-ome decoration in pottery, with
elaborate geometrical patterns ; we also discover interesting attempts
to picture natural forms, such as goats, beetles, &c. Upon the ruins
of this stage of development, which seems to have been checked by
some catastrophe, are founded the glories of Middle. Minoan II, the
period of the great palace of Phaestos and of the first palace of
' See Hall, Proc. Soc. Biblical Archaeology, xxxi, pp. 144-148.

THE OIUGIN OF THE rillLISTINES 17

Knossos. To this period also belongs the magnificent polychrome
pottery called Kamares ware. Another catastrophe took place : the
first palace of Knossos was ruined, and the great second palace built
in its place : and the period known as Middle Minoan III began.
It was distinguished by an intense realism in art, speaking clearly
of a ra})id deterioration in taste. In this period we find the picto-
graphic writing clearly developed, with a hieratic or cursive script
derived from it, adapted for writing witli pen and ink. The Middle
Minoan period came to an end about IGOO h. ( .

Late Minoan I shows a continuation of the taste for realism. Its
pottery is distinguished from that of the preceding period by the
convention that its designs as a rule are painted dark on a light
background : in Middle Minoan III they are painted light on a
dark background. Linear writing is now developed. The palace
of Phaestos is rebuilt. Fine frescoes and admirable sculptured vases
in steatite are found in this period, to which also belong the oldest
remains at Mycenae, namely the famous gold deposits in the shaft
tombs. In Late Minoan II the naturalistic figures become con-
ventionalized, and a degeneration in art sets in which continues into
Late Minoan III. The foreign imports found at Tell el-Amarna
and thus of the time of Ikhnaton, are all of Late Minoan III ; this
affords a valuable hint for dating this phase of development.

Now while some of the earlier periods shade into one another, like
the colours of a rainbow, so that it is difficult to tell where the one
ends and the next begins, this is not the case of the latest periods,
the changes in which have evidently been produced by violence. The
chief manifestation is the destruction of Knossos, which took place,
apparently as a result of invasion from the mainland, at the very
end of the period known as Late Minoan II : that is to sav about
1400 B.C. The inferior style called Late Minoan III — the style which
till recent years we had been accustomed to call Mycenaean — succeeded
at once and without any intermediate transition to the style of Late
Minoan II immediatelv after this raid. It was evidentlv the degraded
style that had developed in the mainland among the successful in-
vaders, founded upon (or, rather, degenerated from) works of art
which had spread by way of trade to the adjacent lands, in the
flourishing days of Cretan civilization.

We have seen that in Egyptian tombs of about 1500 b. c. there are
to be seen paintings of apparently Cretan messengers and merchants,
called by the name of Ktftiu, bearing Cretan goods : and in addition
we find the actual tangible goods themselves, deposited with the
Egyptian dead. In Palestine and elsewhere occasional scraps of

18 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

the ' palace ' styles come to light. But the early specimens of Cretan
art found in these regions are all exotic, just as (to quote a parallel
often cited in illustration) the specimens of Chinese or Japanese
porcelain exhibited in London drawing-rooms are exotic ; and they
affect but little the inferior native arts of the places where they are
found. It is not till we reach the beginning of Late INIinoan III,
after the sack of Knossos, that we find Minoan culture actually taking
root in the eastern lands of the Mediterranean, such as Cyprus and
the adjacent coasts of Asia Minor and Syria. We can hardly dis-
sociate this phenomenon from the sack of Knossos. The very limita-
tions of the area over which the ' Mycenaean ' art has been found
are enough to show that its distribution was not a result of peaceful
trade. Thus, the Ilittite domination of Central and Western Asia
Minor was still strong enough to prevent foreign settlers from
establishing themselves in those provinces : in consequence Mycenaean
civilization is there absent. The spread of the debased Cretan culture
over Southern Asia Minor, Cyprus, and North Syria, between 1400
and 1200 b.c. must have been due to the movements of j)eoples, one
incident in which was the sack of Knossos ^ : and this is true, whether
those who carried the Cretan art were refugees from Crete, or were
the conquerors of Crete seeking yet further lands to spoil.

In short, the sack of Knossos and the breaking of the Cretan power
was an episode — it may be, was the crucial and causative episode — in
a general disturbance which the fourteenth to the twelfth centuries b.c.
witnessed over the whole Eastern Mediterranean basin. The mutual
relations of the different connnunities were as delicately poised as in
modern Europe : any abnormal motion in one part of the system
tended to upset the balance of the whole. Egypt was internally in
a ferment, thanks to the eccentricities of the crazy dilettante Ikhnaton,
and was thus unable to protect her foreign possessions ; the nomads of
Arabia, the Sutu and Ilabiru, were pressing from the South and East
on the Palestinian and Syrian towns ; the dispossessed Cretans were
crowding to the neighbouring lands on the north ; the n)ight of the
Ilittites, themselves destined to fall to pieces not long afterwards,
blocked progress northward : it is little wonder that disorders of
various kinds resulted from the consecjuent congestion.

It is just in this time of confusion that we begin to hear, vaguely
at first, of a number of little nationalities — people never definitely

' Other causes were at work producing the same result of restlessness among the
peoples. Thus Mr. Alton suggests to me that the collapse of the island of Thera
must have produced a considerable disturbance of population in the neigiibouring
lands.

THE ORIGIN OF THE PHIUSTINES 19

assigned to any particular place, but appearing now here, now there,
fighting sometimes with, sometimes against, the Egyptians and their
allies. And what gives these tribelets their surpassing interest is the
greatness of the names they bear. The unsatisfying and contemptuous
allusions of the Egyptian scribes record for us the ' day of small
things *" of people destined to revolutior^ize the world.

We first meet these tribes in the Tell el-Amarna letters. The
king of Alasia (Cy})rus) complains that his coasts are ])eing raided
by the Lulcht, who yearly plunder one small town after another.^
That indefatigable correspondent, Rib-Addi, in two letters, complains
that one Bihura has sent people of the Sutu to his town and slain certain
Sherdan men — apparently Egyptian merceiiaries in the town guard.^
In a mutilated passage in another letter Rib-Addi mentions the
Sherdan again, in connexion with an attempt on his own life. Then
Abi-Milki reports " that ' the king of Danuna is dead, and his brother
has become king after him, and his land is at peace \ It is almost the
only word of peace in the whole dreary Tell el-Amarna record.

Next we hear of these tribes in their league with the Hittites
against Ramessu II, when he set out to recover the ground lost to
Egypt during the futile reign of Ikhnaton.* With the Hittites were
allied people from

_2^

L Rk[w]

-=-a ^^\ (I [I r^^-^ D r d n w

qI r^^Mi M [5] s w
I

AAA/Wl

AA/\/W.

[^-^"^ M, w n w or i r w n w

^ C— ^"^^ ^ t^i:^ Pdi

.sw

no doubt the

^^^|^[v^ Krks

This was in 1333 b. c. On the side of Ramessu fought mercenaries
called S;rd;„; (l>M ^ T ^ ¥ ] ^ l)

1 T.A. Letters, ed. Winckler, No. 28 ; ed. Knudtzon, No. 38.

"" ib. W. T7, K. 123. See also W. 100.

3 ib. W. 151, K. 1.51.

< For an exhaustive study of the great battle of Kadesh between Ramessu and
the united tribes, see Breasted, The Battle of Kadesh (Univ. of Chicago Decennial
Publications, Scr. I, No. 5\

C 2

20 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

Sherdan of whom we have heard ah-eady in the Tell cl-Amarna
letters. These people were evidently ready to sell their services to
whomsoever paid for them, for we find them later operating against
their former Egyptian masters.

About thirty years later, when Merneptah was on the throne, there
was a revolt of the Libyans, and with many allies from the ' Peoples
of the Sea ' they proceeded to attack Egypt. Though the Philistines
do not actually appear among the names of the allies, the history of
this invasion is one of the most important in the oiig'incs of that
remarkable people. The details are recorded in four inscriptions set
up by the king after his victory over the invaders, one of which
inscriptions is the famous ' Israel ' stela.

The first inscription is that of the temple of Karnak, a translation
of which will be found in Breasted's Ancient Records, vol. iii, p. 241.
This inscription begins with a list of the allied enemies :

^-^H^^l^ Trsw

) V5i I R k w

I ^ I

«T *^ w ' ^ ) Vu^ I Srdnw

xS- I A/WW I >^ 1 I

The beginning of the inscription is lost, but the list is probably
complete, as in the secjuel, where the allied tribes are referred to
more than once, no other names are mentioned.

Merneptah, after extolling his own valour and the military
preparations he had made, tells us how he had received news that

i, n I ^ ^ ^ 1 NT (^^^''^I'^i^^i or something similar) ' the miser-
able chief of Libya"*, with his allies aforesaid, had come with his
family to the western boundary of Egypt. Enraged like a lion,
he assembled his officers and to them expressed his o})inion of the
invaders in a way that leaves nothing to the imagination. 'They spend
their time going about and fighting to fill their bellies day by day :
they come to Egypt to seek the needs of their mouths : their chief is
like a dog, without courage . . . .' Some of the vigorous old king's
expressions have been bowdlerised by the hand of Time, which has

THE OllIGIN 01' THE 1»II1LIST1NES n

deprived us of a course of the inscribed masonry of the temple :
but notwithstanding we have an admirable desciiption of restless sea-
rovers, engaged in constant plunder and piracy. Then Merneptah,
strengthened by a vision of his patron Ptah which appeared to hiin
in the night, led out his warriors, defeated the I^ibyans — whose ' vile
fallen chief justified Merneptah\s opinion of him by fleeing, and, in
the words of the official report of the Egyptian general to his master,
' he passed in safety by favour of the night . . . all the gods overthrew
him for the sake of Egypt : his boasting is made void : liis curses
have come to roost : no one knows if he be alive or dead, and even
if he lives he will never rule again. They have put in his place
a brother of his who fights him whenever he sees him \ The list
of slain and captives is much mutilated, but is of some importance.
For the slain were reckoned by cutting off' and counting the phalli of
circumcised, the hands of uncircumcised victims.^ From the classifica-
tion we see that at the time of the victory of Merneptah, the IJbyans
were circumcised, vvhile the Shardanu and Shekelesh and Ekwesh, as
we may provisionally vocalize the names, were not circumcised. The
inscription ends with the flamboyant speech of Merneptah to his
court, and their reply, over which we need not linger. Nor do the
other inscriptions relating to the event add anything of importance
for oiu' present purpose.

About a hundred years later we meet some of these tribes again, on
the walls of the great fortified temple of Medinet Habu near Thebes,
which Ramessu HI, the last of the great kings of Egypt, built to
celebrate the events of his reign. These events are recorded in
sculptured scenes, interpreted and explained by long hieroglyphic
inscriptions. It is deplorable that the latter are less informing than
they might have been : we grudge bitterly the precious space wasted
in grovelling compliments to the majesty of the victorious monarch,
and we would have gladly dispensed with the obscure and would-be
poetical style which the writer of the inscription affected.'-^

Ramessu III came to the throne about 1200 n.c."' Another
Libyan invasion menaced the land in his fifth year, but the energetic
monarch, who had already been careful to organize the military
resources of Egypt, was successful in beating it back. Wai'-galleys

^ See VV. Max Muller's important note in Proc. Sor. Bib. Arch, x, pp. l+7-l.i4,
where reasons are given against tlie exactly opposite interpretation, followed by
many authorities (e.g. Breasted, Ancient Ueconh . On the other hand the c-ontrary
practice seems to be indicated by 1 Sam. xviii. :?.>. The difTuulty of rendering lies
in the fact that we have to deal with Egyptian words not found elsewhere.

- See Breasted, Ancient Records, iv, pp. 1-S.j.

3 Petrie says U02, Breasted 1198.

22 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

from the northern countries, especially the Purasat'i and the Zalckala,
accompanied the invading Libyans ; but this latter element in the
assault was only a foretaste of the yet more formidable attack which
they were destined to make on Egypt three years later — that is to
say, roughly about 1192 n.c.

The inscription describing this war is engraved on the second pylon
of the temple of Medinet Habu. Omitting a dreary encomium of the
Pharaoh, with which it opens, and a long hymn of triumph with which
it ends, we may confine our attention to the historical events recorded
in the hieroglyphs, and pictured in the representations of battles that
accompany them. The inscription records how the Northerners were
disturbed, and proceeded to move eastward and southward, swam[)ing
in turn the land of the Hittites, Carchemish, Arvad, Cyprus, Syria,
and other places in the same region. We are thus to picture a great
southward march through Asia Minor, Syria, and Palestine. Or,
rather, we are to imagine a double advance, by land and by sea : the
landward march, which included t\vo- wheeled ox-carts for the women
and children, as the accompanying picture indicates ; and a sea
expedition, in which no doubt the spare stores would be carried more
easily than on the rough Syrian roads. Clearly they were tribes
accustomed to sea-faring who thus ventured on the stormy Mediter-
ranean ; clearly too, it was no mere military expedition, but a
migration of wanderers accompanied by their families and seeking
a new home,^

The principal elements in the great coalition are the following :

<^ n n AA/VS/V\

I § r d n w
I

D n y n w

D^<=> [^ y V§i i Trstw

T D k r \\

^^^^I'^lflfl^^^^'^ W[?]ss w of the Sea

as well as the Sk rs^w, of which wc have heard in previous documents.

'With hearts confident and full of plans', as the inscription says,

they advanced by land and by sea to Egypt, But Ramessu was

ready ' to trap them like wild-fowl \ He strengthened his Syrian

' Tlie details of these sculptures are more fully described later in this book.

THE ORIGIN OF THE PHILISTINES 23

frontier, and at the same time fortified the liarl)()urs or river mouths
' with warships, galleys, and barges \ The actual battles are not
described, though they are pictured in the accompanying cartoons :
but the successful issue of these military preparations is graphically
recorded. ' Those who reached my boundary,"" says the king, ' their
seed is not : their heart and their soul are finished for ever and ever.
As for those who had assembled before them on the sea . . . they were
dragged, overturned, and laid low upon the beach : slain and made
heaps from end to end of tlieir galleys, while all their things were
cast upon the water.'

The scenes in which the land and na\al engagements are represented
are of great importance, in that they are contemporary records of the
general appearance of the invaders and of their equipment. The naval
battle, the earliest of which any pictorial record remains, is graphically
portrayed. We see the Egyptian archers sweeping the crews of the
invading vessels almost out of existence, and then closing in and finishing
the work with their swords ; one of the northerners' vessels is capsized
and those of its crew who swim to land are taken captive by the
Egyptians waiting on the shore. In later scenes w'e see the prisoners
paraded before the king, and the tale of the victims — counted by
enumerating the hands chopped off the bodies.

The passage in the great Harris Papyrus, which also contains
a record of the reign of Ramessu III,^ adds very little to the informa-
tion afforded us by the Medinet Habu inscription. The ' Danaiuna '
are there spoken of as islanders. We are told that the Purasati
and the Zakkala were ' made ashes ', while the Shekelesh (called in
the Harris Papyrus Shardan% who thus once more appear against
Egypt) and the Washasha were settled in strongholds and bound.
From all these people the king claims to have levied taxes in clothing
and in grain.

As we have seen, the march of the coalition had been successful
until their arrival in Egypt. The Hittites and North Syrians had
been so crippled by them that Ramessu took the opportunity to
extend the frontier of Egyptian territory northward. We need not
follow this campaign, whieli does not directly concern us : but it has
this indirect bearing on the subject, that the twofold ravaging of
Syria, before and after the great victory of Ramessu, left it weakened
and opened the door for the colonization of its coast-lands by the
beaten remnant of the invading army.

Ramessu III died in or about 1167 b.c, and the conquered tribes

' Breasted, op. ril. p. -201.

24 THE SCHWEICH LECTUKKS, 1911

began to recover their lost ground. For that powerful monarch was
succeeded by a series of weak ghost-kiugs who disgraced the great
name of Ramessu which, one and all, they bore. More and more
did they become puppets in the hands of the priesthood, who cared
for nothing but enriching the treasures of their temples. The
frontier of Egypt was neglected, l^ess than a hundred years after
the crushing defeat of the coalition, the situation was strangely
reversed, as one of the most remarkable documents that have come
down to us from antiquity allows us to see. This document is the
famous GolenischefF papyrus, now at St. Petersburg. But before
we proceed to an examination of its contents we must review the
Egyptian materials, which we have now briefly set forth, a little
more closely.

The names of the tribes, with some doubtful exceptions, are easily
equated to those of peoples living in Asia Tvlinor. We may gather
a list of them out of the various authorities which have been set
out above, adding to the Egyptian consonant-skeleton a provisional
vocalization, and remembering that r and / are interchangeable in
Egy})tian :

Tell el-Amarna

Ramessu 11

erneptah

Ramessu III

UOO i!.c.

1333 B.C.

1300 li.c.

c. 1198 B.C.

1. Lukku

—

2. Sherdanu .

3. Danunu .

—

•1. Dardanu .

—

5. Masa

—

6. Mawuna or Yaruna

';0

—

7. Pidasa

—

8. Kelekesh .

—

9. Ekwesh .

—

10. Turisha .

—

11. Shekelcsh

—

13. Pulasati .

—

13. Zakkala .

—

14. Washasha

—

An X denotes 'present in', a — 'absent from' the lists. The
majority of these fourteen names too closely resemble names known
from classical sources for the resemblance to be accidental. It will
be found that almost every one of these names can be easily identified
with the name of the coast dwellers of Asia Minor ; and vice versa^
with one significant exception, the coast-land regions of Asia Minor
are all to be found in recognizable forms in the Egyptian lists. The
-sha or -.sini termination is to be neglected as an ethnic formative.

Tims, begiiming with the Hellespont, the Tiioas is represented in
the Tun.slia, wlio have been correctly identified with the future
Tyhkhjaiaxs (Tursci) as are the Puhi.sat'i with the future Puii.istines.

THE ORIGIN OF THE PHILISTINES '25

Daudanus in the Troad is represented by the Danlanu. They are
the carriers of the Trojan traditions to Italy.^ Mysia is represented
by the Masa, Lydia by the Sherdanu from the town of Saudis.
These are the future Sardixiaxs. And the more inhuid n'^ion of
Maeoxia is echoed in the Mazcnna, if that be the correct readiu<r.
We now come to a gap : the Carians, at the S.\V. corner of Asia
Minor, do not appear in any recognizable form in tlie list, except
that the North Carian town of Pkdasus seems to be echoed l)y
the P'ldasa. To this hiatus we shall return jjresently. The Lyciaxs
are conspicuous as the Lukku.

The name of the sea-coast region of l*amphylia is clearly a later
appellation, expressive of the variety of tribes and nationalities
which has always characterized the Levant coast. The inland Pisidian
town of Sagalassus finds its echo in the Shckelesli. The Ciliciaxs
are represented by the Kelekesh, and this brings us to the corner
between Asia Minor and North Syria.

The only names not represented in the foregoing analysis are
the Danunu, Ekwesh, and the three tribes which first appear in
the Ramessu III invasion, the Pidasati, Zakkala^ and Washasha.
The first two of these, it is generally agreed, are to be equated to the
Daxaoi and the Achakaxs - — the first appearance in historic record
of these historic names. The latter do not appear in the Kamessu III
lists: there Avere no Achaeans in the migration from Asia !Minor.
The Pidasati are unquestionably to be equated to the future Philis-
tines, north of whom we iind later the Zakkala settled on the
Palestinian coast. The Washasha remain obscure, both in origin
and fate; but a suggestion will be made presently regarding them.
They can hardly have been the ancestors of the Indo-European

OSCAXS.

The various lines of evidence which have been set forth in the
preceding pages indicate Crete or its neighbourhood as the probable
land of origin of this group of tribes. They may be recapitulated :

(1) The Philistines, or a branch of them, are sometimes called
Cherethites or Cretans.

(2) They are said to come from Caphtor, a name more like Keftiu
than anything else, which certainly denotes a place where the Cretan
civilization was dominant.

1 Turhha has also been identified with the Cilician town of Tausi s.

2 With reservations : see Weill, Jitivuf arcliioloijiqni', ser. IV, vol. iii, p. (it. And
even the identification of the Danaoi is uncertain. It is at least improbable that
Rib-Addi of Tyre, in the letter quoted above, should report on the peacefulness of
so remote a people as the Danaoi.

26 THE SCIIWEICH LECTURES, 1911

(3) The hieratic school-tablet mentions 'Akasou' as a Keftian
name : it is also Philistine [Achish].

To this may be added the important fact that the Fhacstos disk,
the inscription on which will be considered later in tliis Ijook. shows
us among its signs a head with a plumed head-dress, very similar to
that shown on the Philistine captives represented at ^ledinet Habu.

We must not, however, forget the fact at which we paused for
a moment, that thrice the Philistine guard of the Hebrew kings
are spoken of as the Carians ; and that the Carians are not other-
wise represented in the lists of Egyptian invaders. AVe are probably
not to confine our search for the origin of the Zakkala-Philistine-
W^ashasha league to Crete alone : the neighbouring strip of main-
land coast probably supplied its contingent to the sea-pirates. The
connexion of Caria with Crete was traditional to the time of Strabo ;
' the most generally received account is that the Carians, then called
Leleges, were governed by Minos, and occupied the islands ; then
removing to the continent, they obtained possession of a large tract
of sea-coast and of the interior, by driving out the former occupiers,
who were for the greater part Leleges and Pelasgi.'' ^ Further, he
quotes Alcaeus''s expression, ' shaking a Carian crest,' which is sugges-
tive of the plumed head-dress of the Philistines. Again, speaking
of the city Caunus, on the shore opposite Khodes, he tells us that
its inhabitants ' speak the same language as the Carians, came from
Crete, and retained their own laws and customs'- — which, however,
Herodotus ^ contradicts. Herodotus indeed {loc. c'lt.) gives us the
same tradition as Strabo regarding the origin of the Carians : they

*had come from the islands to the continent. For l)eing subjects
of Minos, and anciently called Leleges, they occupied the islands
without paying any tribute, so far as I can find by in(|uiring into
the remotest times ; but whenever Minos required them, they
manned his ships ; and as Minos subdued an extensive territory, and
was successful in war, the Carians were by far the most famous of
all nations in those times. They also introduced three inventions
which the Greeks have adopted; of fastcnino; crests on hehnets,
putting devices on shields, and putting handles on shields. . . .
After a long time the Dorians and lonians drove the Carians out
of the islands and so they came to the continent. This is the
account that the Cretans give of the Carians, but the Carians do
not admit its correctness, considering themselves to be autochthonous
inhabitants of the continent . . . and in testimony of this they show
an ancient temple of Zeus Carios at Mylasa.'

' .Strabo, xiv. ii. 21. ' .Slrabo, xiv. ii. 3.

= i. 17-'.

THE ORIGIN OI' TIIK rillLISTINES 27

If then by the Puhxsati we are to fill in the hiatus in the Hst ot*
Asia Minor coast-dwellers, the most reasonable explanation of the
name is after all the old theory that it is to be equated with Pelasg't.
And if the worshippers of Zeus Carios settled in Palestine, they
might be expected to bring their god with them and to erect
a temple to him. Now we read in 1 Sanuiel vii, that the Philistines
came up against the Israelites who were holding a religious ceremony
in Mizpah ; that they were beaten back by a thunderstoi-m, and
chased in panic from Mizpah to a place called Beth-Car (v. 11). We
may suppose that the chase stopped at Beth-Car because it was within
Philistine territory ; but unfortunately all the efforts to identify this
place, not otherwise known, have proved futile. Very likely it was
not an inhabited town or village at all, but a sanctuary : it
was raised on a conspicuous height (for the chase stopped under
Beth-Car) : and the name means House of Car,^ as Beth-Dagon means
House or Temple of Dagon. This obscure incident, therefore, affords
one more link to the chain.

If the Cretans and the Carians together were represented by
Zakkala-Pulasati-Washasha league, we might expect to find some
elements from the two important islands of Rhodes and Carpathos,
which lie like the piers of a bridge between Crete and the Carian
mainland. And I think we may, without comparisons too far-fetched,
actuall}' find such elements. Strabo tells us ^ that a former name of
Rhodes was Ophhissa : and we can hardly avoid at least seeing the
similarity between this name and that of the AVashasha.'' And as for
Carpathos, which Homer calls Crapathos, is it too bold to hear in this
classical name an echo of the pre-Hellenic word, whatever it may have
been, which the Egyptians corrupted to Keftiu, and the Hebrews to
Caphtor ? "*

What then are we to make of the name of the ZakKala or
Zakkara? This has hitherto proved a crux. Petrie identifies it
with Zakro in Crete ^ ; but as has several times been pointed out
regarding this identification, we do not know how old the name Zakro
may be. As we have seen that all the other tribes take their name

1 Batex"P in the Greek Version (in some MSS. -Kop). Cf. the first footnote on p. 7.

'^ XIV. ii. 7.

' Hall looks for the Washasha in Crete, and finds them in the name of the Cretan
town fa^os [Oldest Civilization of Greece, p. 177]. But if this comparatively obscure
Cretan name were really represented in the Egyptian lists, we might reasonably
look for the more important names to appear also. The name appears Jn the form
Oasasios) in an inscription from Halicarnassus : see Weill in lievtie urchcoluf/ique,
ser. IV, vol. iii, p. 63.

* Baur, Amos, p. 79, has already suggested this identification.

5 Froc. Soc. Bib. Arch., 1901, p. H.

28 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

from the coasts of Asia Minor, it is probable that the Zakkala are the
Cretan contingents to the coalition : and it may be that in their name
we are to see the interpretation of the mysterious Cashih'im of the
Table of Nations ^ (D^n^D^ being a mistake for 'i^3D), The most
frequently suggested identification, with the Teucriaxs (assigned by
Strabo on the authority of Callinus to a Cretan origin), is perhaps
the most satisfactory as vet })ut forward; notwithstanding the just
criticism of W. Alax Miillcr"^ that the double h and the vowel of the
first syllable are difficulties not to be lightly evaded. Clermont-
Ganneau ^ would equate them to a Nabatean Arab tribe, the Ao)(ap)jroi,
mentioned ])y Stephanus of Byzantium ; but, as Weill ^ points out, it
is highly improbable that one of the allied tribes should have been
Semitic in origin ; if the similarity of names be more than an accident,
it is more likely that the Arabs should have borrowed it.

The conclusion indicated therefore is that the Philistines were a
people composed of several septs, derived from Crete and the south-
west corner of Asia Minor. Their civilization, probably, was derived
from Crete, and though there was a large Carian element in their
composition, they may fairly be said to have been the people who
imported with them to. Palestine the memories and traditions of the
great days of Minos.

^ Gen. X. 11'.

- Mittheil. der I'orderas. Geselhchafl, v, p. o. On Teurersee Frazer, Adoni'i, Attis,
Osirh, p. 112.
^ lleciieil d'Archeoloffie urieid<de, iv. 250. * loc. cif. p. (ik

CHAPTER II

THE HISTORY OF THE PHILISTINES

I. TiiK AnvF.XTUUEs OF AVkx-Amon amon(; tiik.m

The Golenischeff" papyrus' was found in 1891 at El-Khiheh in
Upper Egypt. It is the personal report of the adventures of an
Egyptian messenger to Lebanon, sent on an important semi-religious,
serai-diplomatic mission. The naivete of the style makes it one
of the most vivid and convincing narratives that the ancient East
affords.

Ramessu XII is nominally on the throne, and the papyrus is dated
in his fifth year. The real authority at Thebes is, however, Hrihor,
the high priest of Amon, who is ultimately to usurp the sovereignty
and become the founder of the Twenty-first Dynasty. In Lower
Egypt, the Tanite noble Nesubenebded, in Greek Smendes, has
control of the Delta. Egypt is in truth a house divided against
itself.

On the sixteenth day of the eleventh month of the fifth year of
Ramessu, one Wen-Amon was dispatched from Thebes to fetch
timber for the barge called User-het, the great august sacred barge
of Amon-Ra, king of the gods. Who Wen-Amon may have been,
we do not certainly know ; he states that he had a religious office,
but it is not clear what this was. It speaks eloquently for the rotten
state of Egypt at the time, however, that no better messenger could
be found than this obviously incompetent person — a sort of Egyptian
prototype of the Rev. Robert Spalding ! With him was an image
of Amon, which he looked upon as a kind of fetish, letters of credit
or of introduction, and the wherewithal to purchase the timber.

Sailing down the Nile, Wen-Amon in due time reached Tanis, and
presented himself at the court of Nesubenebded, who with his wife
Tentamon, received the messenger of Anion-Ra with fitting courtesy.
He handed over his letters, which (being themselves unable to
decipher them) they caused to be read : and they said, ' Yea, yea,

^ See Max Miiller, Mitfheilunf/en der deutsclicn vorderastatischen Gesellschaft ,
1900, p. 14 ; Erman, Zeitschr'ift fur iigypt'ische Sprache, xxxviii, p. I ; Breasted,
Ancient Records, iv, p. 274.

30 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

I will do all that our lord Amon-Ra saitli.'' Wen-Ainon tarried at
Tanis till a fortniolit had elapsed from his first setting out from
Thebes ; and then his hosts put him in charge of a certain Mengebti,
captain of a ship about to sail to Syria. This was rather casual ^
e\ndently Mengebti's vessel was an ordinary trading ship, whereas we
might have expected (and as appears later the Syrians did expect)
that one charged with an important special message should be sent
in a special ship. At this point tlie thoughtless "Wcn-Amon made
his first blunder. He forgot all about reclaiming his letters of
introduction from Nesubenebded, and so laid up for himself the
troubles even now in store for the helpless tourist who tries to land
at Beirut without a passport. Like the delightful pilgrimage of the
mediaeval Dominican Felix Fabri, the modernness of tiiis narrative
of antiquity is not one of its least attractions.

On the first day of the twelfth month Mengebti's ship set sail.
After a journey of um-ecorded length the ship put in at Dor,
probably the modern Tantura on the southern coast of the promon-
tory of Carmel. Dor was inliabited by Zakkala (a very important
piece of information) and they had a king named Badyra. AVe are
amazed to read that, apparently as soon as the ship entered the
harboui", this hospitable monarch sent to Wen-Amon ' much breads
a jar of wine, and a joint of beef. I verily believe that this was
a tale got up by some bakhshish-hunting huckster. The simple-
minded tourist of modern days is imposed upon bv similar magnificent
fables.

There are few who have travelled nnich by Levant steamers without
having lost something by theft. Sufferers may claim Wen-Amon as
a companion in misfoitune. As soon as the vessel touched at Dor,
some vessels of gold, four vessels and a jjurse of silver — in all 5 (Icheti
or about 1| lb. of gold and 31 deheii or about 7^ lb. of silver — were
stolen by a man' of the ship, who decamped. This was all the more
serious, because, as appears later, tliese valuables were actually the
money with which Wen-Amon had ])een entrusted for the purchase of
the timber.

So Wen-Amon did exactly what he would have done in the
twentieth century a. n. He went the following inorning and inter-
viewed the governor, Badyra. There was no I'^gyptian consul at the
time, so he was obliged to conduct the interview in person. ' I have
Ijeen robbed in thy harbour," he says, 'and thou, being king, art he
who should judge, and search for my money. 'I'lie money indeed
belongs to Amon-Ra, and Nesubenebded, and Ilrihor my lord : it also
belongs to Warati, and Makamaru, and Zakar-Baal prince of By bios '

THE HISTORY OF THE PHILISTINES 31

— the last three being evidently the names of the merchants who
had been intended to receive the money. The account of Abraham's
negotiations with the Hittites is not more modern than the king's
reply. We can feel absolutely certain that he said exactly the woi-ds
which Wen-Amon puts in his mouth : 'Thy honour and excellency !
Behold, I know nothing of this coni})laint of thine. If the thief were
of my land, and boarded the ship to steal thy treasure, I would even
repay it from mine own treasury till they found who the thief was.
But the thief belongs to thy ship (so I have no responsibility).
Howbeit, wait a few days and I will seek for him."' AVen-Amon had to
be content with this assurance. Probably nothing was done after he had
been bowed out from the governor's presence : in any case, nine days
elapsed without news of the missing property. At the end of the
time Wen-Amon gave up hope, and made up his mind to do the best
he could without the money. He still had his image of Amon-Ra,
and he had a child-like belief that the foreigners would share the
reverent awe with which he himself regarded it. So he sought per-
mission of the king of Dor to depart.

Here comes a lacuna much to be deplored. A sadly broken frag-
ment helps to fill it up, but consecutive sense is unattainable. ' He
said unto me "Silence !" . . . and they went away and sought their
thieves . . . and I went away from Tyre as dawn was breaking . . .
Zakar-Baal, prince of Byblos . . . there I found 30 dehen of silver and
took it . . . your silver is deposited with me ... I will take it . . .
they Avent awav ... I came to . . . the harbour of Byblos and . . .
to Anion, and I put his goods in it. The prince of Byblos sent a
messenger to me . . . my harbour. I sent him a message . . .' These,
with a few other stray words, are all that can be made out. It seems
as though Wen-Amon tried to recoup himself for his loss by
appropriating the silver of some one else. At any rate, the fragment
leaves Wen-Amon at his destination, the harbour of Byblos. Then
the continuous text begins again. Apparently Zakar-Baal has sent
a message to him to begone and to find a ship going to Egypt in
which he could sail. Why Zakar-Baal was so inhospitable does not
appear. Indeed daily, for nineteen days, he kept sending a similar
message to the Egyptian, who seems to have done nothing one way
or another. At last Wen-Amon found a ship about to sail for
Egypt, and made arrangements to go as a passenger in her, despairing
of ever carrying out his mission. He put his luggage on board and
then waited for the darkness of night to come on board with his
image of Amon, being for some reason anxious that none but himself
should see this talisman.

32 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

But now a strange thing happened. One of the young men of
Zakar-Baars entourage was seized with a proplietic ecstasy — the first
occurrence of this phenomenon on record — and in his frenzy cried,
* Bring up the god ! Bring up Anion's messenger that has him !
Send him, and let him go/ Obedient to the prophetic message
Zakar-Baal sent down to the harbour to sunnnon the Egyptian. The
latter was much annoyed, and protested, not unreasonably, at this
sudden change of attitude. Indeed he suspected a ruse to let the
ship go off, with his belongings, and leave him defenceless at the
mercv of the Byblites. The only effect of his protest was an
additional order to ' hold up' the ship as well.

In the morning he presented himself to Zakar-Baal. After the
sacrifice had been made in the castle by the sea-shore where the
prince dwelt, Wen-Amon was brought into his presence. He was
' sitting in his upper chamber, leaning his back against a window,
while the waves of the great Syrian sea beat on the shore behind
him ". To adapt a passage in one of Mr. Rudyard Kipling's best-
known stories, we can imagine the scene, but we cannot imagine
Wen-Amon imagining it : the eye-xoitness speaks in every word of
the picturesque description.

The interview was not pleasant for the Egyptian. It made so
deep an impression upon him, that to our great gain he was able
when writing his report to reproduce it almost verbatim, as follows :

'Anion's favour upon thee,' said Wen-Amon.

' How long is it since thou hast left the land of Anion t ' demanded
Zakar-Baal, apparently without returning his visitor's salutation.

' Five months and one day,' said Wen-Amon.

(This answer shows how much of the document we have lost. We
cannot account for more than the fourteen days spent between Thebes
and Tanis, nine days at Dor, nineteen days at Byblos — six weeks in
all — plus the time spent in the voyage, which at the very outside
could scarcely have been more than another six weeks.)

' Well then, if thou art a true man, where are thy credentials ? '

We remember that Wen-Amon had left them with the prince of
Tanis, and he said so. Then was Zakar-Baal very wroth. ' What !
There is no writing in thy hand "^ And where is the ship that
Nesubenebded gave thee .'' Where are its crew of Syrians .^ For
sure, he would never have put thee in charge of this (incompetent
Egyptian) who would have drowned thee— and then where would
they have sought their god and thee .'' '

This is the obvious sense, though injured by a slight lacuna.
Nothing more clearly shows how the reputation of Egypt had sunk

THE HISTORY OF THE PHH.ISTINES 33

in the interval since the exph)its of llamessu HI. Zakai--li,ial speaks
of Mengebti and his Egyptian crew with much the same contempt as
Capt. Davis in Stevenson's Ebb-tide speaks of a crew of Kanakas.
Wen-Amon ventured on a mild protest. ' Nesubencbded has no
Svrian crews : all his ships are manned with Egyptians.''

'There are twenty ships in my harbour,' said Zakar-Baal sharply,

'and ten thousand ships in Sidon "" The exaggeration and the

aposiopesis vividly mirror the vehemence of the speaker. He was
evidentlv going on to say that these ships, though Egyptian, were
all manned by Syrians. But, seeing that Wen-Amon w^as, as he
expresses it, 'silent in that supreme moment ' he broke off", and
abruptly asked —

' Now, Avhat is thy business here .'' ''

AVe are to remember that AVen-Amon had come to buy timber,
but had lost his money. We cannot say anything about whether he
had actually recovered the money or its equivalent, because of the
unfortunate gap in the document already noticed. However, it would
appear that he had at the moment no ready cash, for he tried the
effect of a little blufl". ' I have come for the timber of the great
august barge of Amon-Ka, king of the gods. Thy father gave it, as
did thy grandfather, and thou wilt do so too."

But Zakar-Baal was not impressed. 'True,' said he, 'they gave
the timber, but they were paid for it : I will do so too, if I be paid
likewise.' And then we are interested to learn that he had his father's
account-books brought in, and showed his visitor the records of large
sums that had been paid for timber. ' See now,' continued Zakar-
Baal in a speech rather difficult to construe intelligibly, ' had I and
mv property been under the king of Egypt, he would not have sent
money, but would have sent a conunand. These transactions of my
father's were not the payment of tribute due. I am not thy servant
nor the servant of him that sent thee. All I have to do is to speak,
and the logs of Lebanon lie cut on the shore of the sea. But where
are the sails and the cordage thou hast brought to transport the logs ?
. . . Egypt is the mother of all equipments and all civilization ; how
then have they made thee come in this hole-and-corner way ?' He
is evidently still dissatisfied with this soi-disant envoy, coming in
a common passenger ship without passport or credentials.

Then AVen-Amon played his trump card. He produced the image
of Amon. 'No hole-and-corner journey is this, O guilty one !' said
he. ' Amon owns every ship on the sea, and owns Lel^anon which thou
hast claimed as thine own. Amon has sent me, and Hrihor my lord
has made me come, bearing this great god. And yet, though thou didst

34 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

well know that he was here, thou hadst kept him waiting twenty-nine
days in the harbour.^ Former kings have sent money to thy fathers,
but not life and liealth : if thou do the hid(hng of Amon, he will
send thee life and health. Wish not for tlivself a thing belonging to
Amon-Ra.'

These histrionics, liowever, did not im])ress Zakar-Baal any more
than the previous speech. Clearly Wen-Amon saw in his face that
tlie lord of Bvblos was not overawed by the image of his god, and
that he wanted something more tangible than vague promises of life
and health. So at length he asked for his scribe to be brought him
that he might write a letter to Tanis, praying for a consignment of
goods on account. The letter was written, the messenger dispatched,
and in about seven weeks returned with a miscellaneous cargo of gold,
silver, linen, 500 rolls of papyrus (this is important), hides, rope,
lentils, and fish. A little present for Wen-Amon himself was sent as
well by the ladv Tentamon. Then the business-like prince rejoiced,
we are told, and gave the \vord for the felling of the trees. And at
last, some eight months after Wen-Amon's departure from Thebes,
the timber lay on the shore ready for delivery.

A curious passage here follows in the papyrus. It contains
one of the oldest recorded jokes — if not actually the oldest — in the
world. When Zakar-Baal came down to the shore to give the
timber over to Wen-Amon, he was accompanied by an Egyptian butler,
by name Pen- Amon. The shadow of Zakar-Baal's parasol happened
to fall on the envoy, whereupon the butler exclaimed, ' Lo, the
shadow of Pharaoh thy lord falleth on thee ! "* The point of the
witticism is obscure, but evidently even Zakar-Baal found it rather
too extreme, for he sharply rebuked the jester. But he })roceeded
himself to display a delicate humour. ' Now,' said he, ' I have done
for thee what my fathers did, though thou hast not done for me what
thy fathers did. Here is the timber lying ready and complete. Do
what thou wilt with it. But do not be contemplating the terror of
the sea' (there cannot be tlie slightest doubt that Wen-Amon was at
this moment lilancinfj over the waters and estimatini; his chances of
a smooth crossing). ' Contemplate for a moment the terror of IVIe !
Ramessu IX sent some messengers to me and' — here lie turned to the
butler — ' G(i thou, and show him their graves ! '

' Oh, let me not see them ! ' was the agonized exclamation of Wen-
Amon, anxiotis now above all things to be off without further delay.
'Those were people wlio had no god with them! Wherefore dost
thou not instead erect a tablet to record to all time " that Amon-Ra
' An inconsistency : he has added ten days to his former statement.

THE HISTOllV 01' THE I'lIILISTINES 35

sent to me and I sent timber to Egypt, to beseech ten tliousaiid years
of life, and so it came to pass " ? "*

'Truly that would be a great testimony 1" said the sarcastic ])riiice,
and departed.

Wen-Amon now set about loading his timber. But })resently
there sailed eleven ships of the Zakkala into the harbour — possibly
those on whom he had made a rash attempt at piracy to recoup him-
self for his losses at Dor. The merchants in them demanded his
arrest. The poor Egyptian sat down on the shore and wept. ' They
have come to take me again ! "" he cried out — it would appear that
he had been detained by the Zakkala before, but the record of this
part of his troubles is lost in one of the lacunae of the MS. We
despair of him altogether when he actually goes on to tell us that
when news of this new trouble reached Zakar-Baal, that magnate
wept also. However, we need not question the charming detail that
he sent to Wen-Amon an Egyptian singing-girl, to console him with
her songs. But otherwise he washed his hands of the whole affair.
He told the Zakkala that he felt a delicacy about arresting the
messenger of Anion on his own land, but he gave them permission to
follow and arrest him themselves, if they should see fit. So away
Wen-Amon sailed, apparently without his timber, and presumably
with the Zakkala in pursuit. But he managed to evade them.
A wind drove him to Cyprus. The Cypriotes came out, as he
supposed, to kill him and his crew ; but they brought them Ijefore
Hatiba, their queen. He called out ' Does any one here understand
Egyptian ? ' One man stepped forward. He dictated a petition to
be translated to the queen

And here the curtain falls abruptly, for the papyrus breaks off,
and the rest of this curious tragi-comedy of three thousand years ago
is lost to us.

We see from it that the dwellers on the Syrian coast had com-
pletely thrown off the terror inspired by the victories of llamessu HI.
An Egyptian on a sacred errand from the greatest men in the
country, bearing the image of an Egyptian god, could be robbed,
bullied, mocked, threatened, thwarted in every possible way.
Granted that he was evidently not the kind of man to connnand
respect, yet the total lack of reverence for the royalties who had sent
him, and the sneers at Egypt and the Egy})tian rulers, are \ery
remarkable.

We see also that the domain of the 'People of the Sea' was
more extensive than the scanty strip of territory usually allowed them
on Bible maps. Further evidence of this will meet us presently,

36 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

but meanwhile it may be noted that the name 'Palestine*' is much
less of an extension of the name 'Philistia'' than the current maps
would have us suj)pose. In other words, the two expressions are
more nearly sMionvmous than they are generally taken to be. We
find Dor. south of Carniel, to be a Zakkala town ; and Zakkala ships
are busy in the ports further north.

Indeed, one is half inclined to see Zakkala dominant at Bvblos
itself. Wen-Amon was a person of slender education — even of his
own language he Avas not a master — and he was not likely to render
foreign names correctly. Probably he could speak nothing but Egyp-
tian : he was certainly ignorant of the language of Cyprus, whatever
that may have been : and possibly linguistic troubles are indicated by
his rendering of the name of the lord of Byblos. Can it be that
this was not a name at all, but a title (or rather the Semitic transla-
tion of a title, given by a Zakkala dragoman) : that Zakar is not
13r ' remember \ but the name of the ZaJcJcala : and that Baal here,
as frequently elsewhere, means 'lord' in a human and not a divine
sense .'' If so, the name would mean ' the lord of the Zakkala \
a phrase that recalls 'the lords of the Philistines' in the Hebrew
Scriptures. The syntax assumed is of course quite un-Semitic : but
it is often the case in dragomans' translations that the syntax of the
original language is preserved. Something like this idea has been
anticipated by M. A. J. Reinach.^

Zakar-baal was no mere pirate chieftain, however. He was a sub-
stantial, civilized, and self-reliant prince, and contrasts most fiivour-
ably with the weak, half-blustering, half-lacrimose Egyptian. He
understood the Egyptian language ; for he could rebuke the jest of
his Egyptian l)utler, who would {)resumably speak his native tongue
in 'chaffing' his compatriot ; and no doubt the interview in the upper
room was carried on in Egyptian. He was well accpiainted with the
use of letters, for he knew where to jnit his finger on the relevant
parts of the accounts of his two predecessors. These accounts were
probably not in cuneiform characters on clay tablets, as he is seen to
import large (juantities of papvi'iis from Egypt. He is true to his
old maritime traditions : he builds his house where he can watch the
great waves of the Mediterranean beat on the shore, and he is well
informed about the ships in his own and the neighbouring har))()urs,
and their crew s.

There is a dim i-ecollection of a Philistine occu[)ation of Phoenicia

' ' Byblos, oil ngne un prince qui pourrait bicn I'trc un Trhihara semitist', si Ton
en croit son nom de Tcliakar-baal.' JUrue archcoloi/ujtif, scr. IV, vol. xv, p. 4.5.

THE IIIST()I{V OF THE PHILISTINES 37

recorded for us in an oft-cjiioted passage of Just in (xviii. ',}. 5),'
in which he mentions a raid by the king of Ashkelon, just before tlie
fall of Troy, on the riioenician tow n of Sidon (so called from an
alleged Phoenician word ' sidon \ meaning ' (isir). This is of course
merely a saga-like tradition, and as we do not know from what
authority Justin drew his information we can hardly put a very
heavy strain upon it. And yet it seems to hang together with the
other evidence, that in the Mycenaean period, when Troy was taken,
there actually was a Philistine settlement on the Phoenician coast.
As to the specific mention of Ashkelon^ a suggestion, perhaps a little
venturesome, may be hazarded. The original writer of the history
of this vaguely-chronicled event, whoever he may have been, possibly
recorded correctly that it was the Znkkala who raided Sidon. Some
later author or copyist was puzzled by this forgotten name, and
'emended' a rege Sacaloniorum to a rege Ascaloniorum. Stranger
things have happened in the course of manuscript transmission. -

The Papyrus gives us some chronological indications of importance.
The expedition of Wen-Amon took place in the fifth year of Ilamessu
XII, that is to say, about 1110 n.c. Zakar-Baal had already been
governor of Byblos for a considerable time, for he had received
envoys from Hamessu IX (1144-1129). Suppose these envoys to
have come about 1130, that gives him already twenty years. The
envoys of Ilamessu IX were detained seventeen years ; but in the
first place this may have been an exaggeration, and in the second
place we need not suppose that many of those seventeen years
necessarily fell within the reign of the sender of these messengers.
Further, Zakar-BaaPs father and grandfather had preceded him in
office. We do not know how long they reigned, but giving twenty-
five years to each, which is probably a high estimate, we reach the
date 1180, which is sufficiently long after the victory of Ramessu III
for the people to begin to recover from the ])low which that event
inflicted on them.

^ ' Et quoniam ad Carthaginiensium inentionem uentum est, de origine eoruni
pauca dicenda sunt, repetitis Tyriorum paulo altius rebus, quorum casus etiam
dolcndi fuerunt. Tyriorum gens condita a Phocnieibus fuit, qui terraeraotu uexati,
relicto patriae solo, Assyrium stagnum prinio, niox mari proximum littus incoluc-
runt, condita ibi urbe quam a piscium ubertate Sidona appellaucrunt ; nam piscem
Phoenices sidon uocant. Post multo.s deindc annos a rege Asc'aloniorum expugnati,
nauibus appulsi, Tyron urbem ante annum Troianae cladis condiderunt.'

^ On the other hand Scylax in his I'erqihts calls Ashkelon "a lity of the
Tyrians '.

38 THE SCHWEICII LECTURES, 1911

II. TiiEiii SrurcGLE with the Hebrews

We now turn to the various historical referenc-es to the Philistines
in the Hebrew Scriptures.

It happens that the Zakkala, with whom the Golenischeff' Papyrus
is concerned, are not mentioned bv name in the received text of the
Old Testament. The southern Philistines were more conspicuous in
the history of the Hebrews, and this name is in consequence used
indifferently for all the tribal subdivisions of the hated enemy. The
first appearance of the Philistines on the coast of Southern Pales-
tine is not recorded in the Old Testament, but it may possibly be
inferred indirectly. In the oldest monument of Hebrew speech,
the Song of Deborah, the tribe of Dan is referred to as a maritime
people who ' remained in ships ' while their brethren bore the brunt
of the invasion of Sisera. Towards the end of the Book of Judges,
we find that certain of the tribe of Dan are compelled to seek a home
elsewhere, and choose the fertile, well-watered, but hot and fever-
haunted I^aish, a place remote from everywhere, and where the
people were '(juief— as they well might be in that malaria-stricken
furnace. Why did the Danites leave for this unsatisfactory territory
their healthy and rich land by the sea-coast ? Probably because they
were driven by pressure from without. The migration of the Danites
can best be explained by the settlement of the Philistines. And it
is suggestive that the first great champion to stand for Israel against
the intruders, Samson, belonged to Zorah, whence went forth the
Danite spies (Judg. xviii. 2).

The first allusion to the Philistines which we meet with in the Old
Testament, that in the genealogical table of the nations in Genesis x,
we have already discussed. Next we find a cycle of stories, told with
but little variation both of Abraham and of Isaac (Gen. xx, xxi, xxvi),
in which those heroes of old are brought into contact with a certain
' Abimelech, king of the Philistines '. In both cases the patriarch,
to save himself, conceals his true relationship to his wife, which is
revealed to the deceived monarch : in both, the latter displays a
singular dignity and righteousness in the delicate position in which
his guesfs du[)licity places him : and in both there is a .subsecjuent
dispute about the possession of wells. The stories are in short
doublets of one another, and both echo a similar tale told of Abraham
in Egypt, at an earlier stage of his career (Gen, xii). Whoever
added the inept title to Psalm xxxi\ evidently had these stories in
his mind when he inadvertently wrote 'a Psalm of David when he
changed his behaviour hoiovQ J hi melech'' instead oi' Achish: an un-

THE HISTOliV OF THE rHILISTINES 39

conscious reminiscence oftiie tide mi^ht possibly have been sugfrcsted
by vv. 12, 13 of the l*s;dni in cjuestion.

The use of the word ' IMiilistine ' in these stories has long been
recognized as an anachronism. Perhaps with less harshness and equal
accuracy we might characterize it as a rather free use of modern names
and circumstances in telling an ancient tale. Even now we might
find, for example, a popular writer on history saying that this event
or that of the Early British period took place 'in Norfolk ^ although
it is obvious that the territory of the North Eolk nmst have received
its Saxon name in later times. The tales of Abraham and Isaac were
written when the land where their scenes were laid was in truth the
Land of the Philistines ; and the story-teller Avas not troubled with
the question as to how far back that occupation lasted. Indeed when
Abimelech first appears on the scene he is not a Philistine, but the
Semitic king of the town of Gerar. The two passages in Gen. xxi,
which might be understood ' they returned into [what we call]
Philistia ""...' Abraham sojourned in [what is now] Philistia ', have
misled the writer (or copyist) of Gen. xxvi into supposing that
Abimelech was actually king of the Philistines. In fact the Greek
Version of xxvi. 8 seems to preserve an indication of older readings
in which he was simply called, as in the other story, king of
Gerar.

Noordtzij {Filist. p. 59) attempts to demonstrate a pre-llamessu
occupation of S. Palestine by the Philistines, principally on the ground
that the time between Ramessu III and Samson or Saul is too short
for the ' semitizing ' process to have taken place. This seems hardly
a cogent argument to me : the ' semitization ' was by no means
complete : the special Semitic rite of circumcision was not adopted :
there is no reason to suppose that the language of the Philistines
had been abandoned for a Semitic language. And we need have no
difficulty in supposing such changes to take place with great rapidity.
Thanks to the undermining influence of returned American emigrants,
the Irish peasant has shown a change of attitude towards traditional
beliefs in fairies and similar beings within the past twenty years as pro-
found as any change tliat inigul have taken place between Ramessu III
and Saul under the influence of the surrounding Semitic populations.
A similar anachronism meets us in Exodus xiii. 17, enshrining an
ancient tradition that the ordinary caravan-route from Egypt by way
of the coast was avoided in preference to the long and wearisome
march through the desert, in order to keep clear of the Philistines
and their military prowess. Likewise in the song preserved in
Exodus XV, we find (v. 14) despondency attributed to the dwellers

40 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

ill Pliilisti.i at the news of the crossing" of the Red Sea. This song,
however, is probal)ly not very ancient.

On the other hand, the writers who have contributed to the
Pentateuch in its final form do not all share the indifference to
chronoloL;ical detail shown by the Yahwist story-teller. Often as
are the tribes of Canaan enumerated in passages anticipatory of the
con(|uest of the Promised Land, the Philistines are never mentioned :
thev have no share in the territory of the Hittite, the Girgashite, the
Amorite, the Canaanite, and the Jebusite. In view of the prominence
of the Philistines in the later history, this is a very significant fact.
The solitary exception is so vague that it might almost be said to
prove the rule — a reference to the Mediterranean sea by the name of
'the Sea of the Philistines' in Exodus xxxiii. 3L In Joshua xiii. 2,
the ' districts "" or ' circles'* of the Philistines are enumerated among
the places not conquered by the leader of the Hebrew inmiigration —
the following verse, to which we shall return later, enumerates the
' districts '. But there is no reference to the Philistines in the parallel
accoimt contained in Judges i. There, in verse 19, the ' dwellers in the
valley \ i. e. in the low coast-land on which the Judahite territory
bordered, are depicted as successfully resisting the aggression of the
Hebrew tribe with the help of their iron chariots : the previous verse,
which contradicts this, and -which unhistorically claims that Judah
captured the cities Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ekron, must necessarily be an
interpolation.^ In Judges iii. 3 we find an agreement with the passage
just cited from Joshua — the five lords of the Philistines, as well as the
' Canaanites '' (whatever may be exactly meant by the name in this
connexion), the Phoenicians, and the Hi[tt]ites are enumerated as
being left unconcjuered. The curious reason assigned, that this was
to practise the Hebrews in war, is at any rate concordant with the
old tradition that the terror of the warlike Philistines prevented the
Hebrews following the direct route into the Px'omised Land.

The {)assages examined so far have rather been concerned with the
settlement of the protagonists in the great struggle for the possession
of Palestine than with the course of the struggle itself. AVe are to
picture tlie Hebrew tril)es crossing the Jordan from the East, and
some little lime afterwai'ds the Pliilistines (and Zakkala) establishing
themselves on the rich coast-lands: this much we can see with the
aid of the Egyptian records cited in the preceding pages. AVe now
follow the histoi-y of the conflict.

At the outset we are confronted by a i)uz/ling group of passages.
In the very ancient Song of Deborah, picturing the distracted state
' See Moore's Commentary, p. 37.

THE HISTORY OF THE PHHISTINES 4-1

of the country under foreign oppressors, the writer (l(.>(rilns hou
travellers and caravans, from fear, abandoned the main thoroughfares
and journeyed along the by-paths, of which the winding valleys of
Palestine offer an endless choice. This was in the days of a certain
Shamgar son of Anath ^ (Judges v, G). Tl\e name has a foreign
appearance-: a Hittite analogy (Sangar) has been sought for it.
We cannot, however, conclude that he was necessarily a foreigner,
even though his progenitor is said to be Anath, which happens
to be a well-known goddess-name. There is not another case ot
a Hebrew bearing so frankly idolatrous a name in the Old Testa-
ment. But in the Aswan papyri we have a glimpse of what
Jewish life was, independent of priestly influences ; and these
show an extraordinary tolerance of heathen names and practices.
We find Hosea son of Peti-Khnum. Names like 'Athar-ili, Nebo-
nathan, Ben-Tirash occur in the community : the daughter of one
Mahseiah swears in a law-court by the goddess Sati. Shamgar son
of Anath would have been quite at home in this company.

The antecedent for this reference in Deborah's Song a})pears to lie
in a verse at the end of chapter iii (v. 31), which says that Shamgar
son of Anath killed six hundred Philistines with an ox-goad, and
saved Israel. It is, however, obvious that this verse is out of place.
It interrupts the flow of the narrative : there is no word of Philistine
oppression in the context, and the text proceeds ' A\'hen Ehud was
dead . . . ' certain things happened, following on the story of Ehud
which the Shamgar passage interrupts. The later development of
the history contains no recognition of the labours of Shamgar. There
are indeed few passages in literature which are so clearly no part of
the original document: and we can hardly doubt that it has been
inserted from some other source, or from another part of the book, in
order to provide an explanation for the allusion in Deborah's Song.

It is curious that the chief Greek MSS. read Auax instead of
* Anath ' here, but not in Deborah's Song.^ A number of Greek MSS.
repeat the verse relating to Shamgar after xvi. 31— i. e. innnediately
after the story of Samson. This seems a better place for it.*

1 The additional note of time, 'In the days of Jael', is generally rejected as
a gloss.

- See Moore's Judges, pp. 14-2, IW, and Journal of American Oriental SorUtj/,
xixb, p. 159.

» The name Shamgar is given as -Sa/^fyap, :Safjiayap, ^e^ic/ap, 2f/^a7a/>, A^eyaO,
■Xaniyae, naiycip, E^ityap. His father's name in Judges iii is given as Awax, Aftvax,
RvaO, Efax, Aipioe, AaaO ; in Judges V as AvaO, Ktvad, EvaO, EvaOajx, AreOffi.

* The verse as repeated says that ' Scmegar (or Emegar' son of Anan (Ainan,
Enan) arose after Samson, and slew of the Foreigners, GOO men without the cattle,
and he also saved Israel'. Note the transformation of the ox-goad.

42 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

The Shamgar story, in short, looks like one of the floating traditions
that have more particularly crystallized round Samson and the mighty
men of David. A remarkable parallel to the exploit of Shamgar has
been found in the deed of ' Shammah the Hararite '—a not dissimilar
name — one of David's followers, who in some such rough and ready
way defended a field of crops — barley or lentils— from Philistine
marauders.^

But can the story be so summarily dismissed ? Grant all the
difficulties — that Shamgar's name has a foreign aspect, that the prose
account of him is an interpolation, that the Philistines seem to appear
too early on the scene ; yet the scanty allusion to this obscure
champion may after all record a tradition of the beginnings of the
great struggle.

For besides Shamgar, Deborah's Song mentions another arresting
personality. The very grandeur of the paean throws a romantic halo
round the person of the unfortunate Sisera, victim of a crime against
the desert law of hospitality difficult to parallel even in the wild
annals of Bedawin life. The heartless glee with which the poet
triumphs over the chieftain''s anxious, watching mother makes the
latter for us one of the most pathetic figures in the whole crowded
gallery of the Old Testament. Time has brought its revenge for both
motlier and son.

In the prose version of the combat, Sisera is represented as the
general of Jabin, king of Hazor, and the latter is the head of the
attack on Israel. But Jabin has an altogether secondary place in the
narrative, and Sisera is the central figure. Jabin, indeed, is probably
imported into the story from the source that lies at the back of
Joshua xi, where there is no mention of Sisera. In Psalm Ixxxiii. 9
Sisera is mentioned before Jabin. He has a town of his own,
' Harosheth of the Gentiles,'' more than a day's journey from the
city of Jabin ; and the vignette of his mother surrounded by her
court ladies gives us a picture of a more important estal)lishment
than that of a mere captain of a host. Sisera in short is an indepen-
dent king, and the story as we have it is either an account of a single
campaign in which two kings were in league, or, more })robably,
a combination of the narratives of two campaigns whollv independent.

Harosheth is generally identified wiMi the modern Harathiveh, in the
bottle-neck which forms the mouth of the plain of Esdraelon — a region
entirely in Philistine hands, at least at the end of Saul's wars. This
identification seems fairly trustworthy. Not far off from Harosheth
was a village with the name Beth-dagon : and Harosheth itself is distin-
' 2 Sam. xxiii. 11 ; 1 Chron. xi. 13.

THE HISTORY OF THE PHHJSTINES 4;J

guished by the appellation 'of the goylm"' or foreigners. In Joshua
xii. 23 'the king of the govini in Gilgal ' is mentioned in noteworthy
juxtaposition with Dor, whieh figures so conspicuously in the report
of Wen-Anion ; hut this passage has been suspected and various
emendations suggested, chief of which is to read b^bib for bibib and
to translate ' king of nations belonging to Galilee'. This is of course
reminiscent of the famous 'Galilee of the Gentiles'^; but on the
other hand we may compare nc'^2 ni/''^J 'the Galilees of Philistia'' in
Joshua xiii. 2 and Joel iii. 4 ( = Hebrew iv. 4), which in the latter
passage is mentioned immediately after the Philistine territory. The
word goylm is of no more specific meaning than our word 'nations' :
though usually applied to foreigners, it may even on occasion be
applied to the nation of Israel : so it cannot be said to be very
conclusive. But one wonders whether in such passages and phrases
as these it might not bear the special meaning of the foreigners paj-
excellence, the most outlandish people with whom the Hebrews came
into contact — that is to sav the Philistines and their cognate tribes,
for whom the Greek translators reserve the name a\\6(j)vkoi. In the
present case they would more especially be the Zakkala, of whom
Wen-Amon tells us, but who are not mentioned by name in the
Hebrew writings.

Sisera's enormous host of iron chariots, a possession which, as we
saw, also enabled the coast-dwellers of the South to hold their own, is
emphasized in the prose account of the battle, as in the speech put
by Deborah's Song into his mother's mouth : and it is interesting to
notice that we hear again of these iron chariots as being on the plain
of Esdraelon (Joshua xvii. 16).

The name of the prince nlso is suggestive. It is not Semitic : and
the numerous Hittite names ending in 6v';-a— Khetasira and the like —
have been quoted to indicate its possible origin. But we should not
forget Badyra, the Zakkala prince of the r.eighbouring town of Dor.
And may it not be asked whether Sisera, XIDT, could he a reduplicated
for)ri derived from the root of pD sereii (the latter being possibly
a participle), the one word of the Philistine language which we
certainly know — the technical term for the 'lords' of the Philistine
state? This guess presupposes that the language of the Philistines
was Indo-European — an assumption which it has not yet been possible
either to prove or disprove. Some possible evidence of reduplication is
afforded by such combinations as R E R E I ET and perha})s KRKOKLES
in the Praesos inscriptions. It is interesting to note that the name

' Isa. ix. 1 ( = Hebrew viii. -23).

44 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

Benesasint occur.s in the list of Keftian names on the Egyptian tablet
described on a previous page.

If Sisera was a PhiHstine or at least one of cognate race, we have
some use for Shamgar and his ox-goad. Otherwise, the latter must be
expunged from the list of Judges, if he be not actually numbered among
the oppressors, as Moore in his Conunentary is inclined to do. The
combination AN A IT, which ends one of the Praesos inscriptions just
mentioned, has been compared to the name of Shamgar's parent
Anath ; but there is no probability that such a coincidence between
a short inscription on the one hand, and a few proper names on the
other, is of any importance.

In Judges x. 6, 7, 11 there is mention of Philistine oppression, in
strange and scarcely intelligible connexion with the Amorites. This
passage does not help us nearer to the solution of problems. It is in
the narrative of Samson that the Philistines first come conspicuously
on the scene. It is unnecessary to sunnnarize the familiar incidents :
indeed for our purpose these chapters, though of the deepest interest,
are disappointing. The narrator is content to tell his tale, without
troubling himself about the attendant circumstances which we would
so gladly know.

In discussing this remarkable series of episodes it is unnecessary
to raise the question of their historicity.^ Still more irrelevant
would be a discussion of the pseudo-scientific hypothesis that Samson
(like Achilles, Heracles, Max Midler, Gladstone, and other demonstrated
characters of mythology) was a solar myth. It is sufficient for the
purpose of our present discussion that the tale gives us an early
tradition of the condition of affairs at the time indicated ; and as
I have said elsewhere,- it is probably to be regarded as a prose epic
concentrating into the person of a single ideal hero the various
incidents of a guerrilla border- warfare.

This Ix'ing postulated, one or two points of importance strike us in
reading the story. The first is, that the Philistine domination was
complete, a}id was passively accepted by the Hebrews. ' The Philis-
tines are rulers over us ' say the men of Judah, who propose to betray
the champion to his enemies. As is so often the case with a nation of
separate clans, even the pressure of a formidable common enemy can-
not always heal their mutual jealousies. Ireland, in the face of the
Vikings in the ninth century, and of the English in the twelfth, offers

' For a study (from a c'onservative standjioint) of tlie liistoricity of tlie Samson
narrative see Sdm.fon, nine i'litersuchimg dex historinch<n ClKtraktem run Richt.
xiii-xvi, von Dr. Kdmund Kalt, Freiburg i. Br., 1912. This brochure contains a very
useful bibliograjjliy.

* y/ //is/i,r>/ nf C'lv'il'i-jiilon in Palestine, p. ji.

THE HISTORY OF THE PHILISTINES 45

ail instructive parallel. Only a chapter or two l)eforc the appearance
of Samson, we have the distractini^ ej)iso(le of Al)iinelech: a chapter
or two later comes the story of the massacre of the lienjamites by the
other tribes : and wliate\er may be the true chronological relationship
of these narratives to the historical setting of the Samson epic, they
at least indicate that there was a long period of inter-tribal disunion
that would make it easy for a well-organized military nation to gain
complete domination over the country.

But it was no mere military domination. The Philistines were
accompanied by their wives and daughters, and the attractiveness of
the latter in the eyes of Samson is a leading motive of his story. On
this side of the narrative, however, there is one point to be noticed.
There is no reason for branding the Philistines with the stigma of
having produced the mercenary traitress Delilah : indeed, whatever
indications there may be in her story point in an exactly opposite
direction. Had tradition called her a Philistine, like Samson's first
wife, the author of Judges would hardly have failed to make it clear.
She is described as a Avomaii in the Valley of Sorek ; which, if it be the
modern Wady es-Surar, as is generally agreed, was partly in Israelite
territory. Moreover, it would scarcely have been necessary for the
Philistine lords to have offered the gigantic bribe of 1,100 pieces of
silver each, to a woman of their own nation, that she might betray to
them the arch-enemy of her race : it would be much more likely that
they would use the persuasive argument of threatening her with the
fate of her unlucky predecessor. The name appears again as that
of a member of the tribe of Judah, in a genealogical fragment in
1 Chronicles iv. 19, preserved by the Greek Version, but lost from the
Hebrew textus receptus. It is not too much to say that if the Delilah
episode be read carefully, the various steps become more natural and
intelligible when we picture the central figure as a tribeswoman of the
men of Judah, who in the previous chapter had attempted to antici-
pate her act of betrayal.

It is noteworthy that nowhere in the Samson story is there any
hint that there was a barrier of language between Hebrew and
Philistine. Samson and his Philistine friends at Timnah exchange
their rough jests Avithout any difficulty ; Delilah, whatever her race,
converses with equal ease with the Philistine lords and with her
Hebrew husband. The same point is to be noticed throughout the
subsequent history, with the curious and significant exception of
the very last reference to the Philistines in the historical books.
Indeed, it has often been observed that the services of an interpreter
are but rarely called for in the Old Testament : although it is possible

46 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

that sLicli an intermediary was sometimes used without the fact being
specifically stated.^ But probably in ancient as in modern Palestine
everybody \\ ho had any position at all to maintain could speak several
languages. The officers of Hezekiah and Sennacherib, for instance,
could understand each the other's tongue, and could pass from one to
the other with the enviable ease of a modern Levantine polyglot.

The incident of Samson's hair has often been compared to the
purple hair of Nisus, plucked out by Scvlla at the instigation of
Minos ; and to the story of Pterelaos of Taphos and his golden hair
given him by Poseidon, which rendered him immortal. Both stories
are to be found in that endless mine, the B'lbliotheca of Apollodorus.
The connexion of Minos with the former story is noteworthy. It has,
I believe, been suggested (but I have no note of the reference) that
the story of the virtue inherent in Samson's locks may have been
actually received by the Hebrews from Philistine sources. It may
be merely a coincidence that the name of Samson's father, ]\Ianoah,
resembles the name Minos.

Lastly, we notice in the Samson epic that as seen through Hebrew
eyes the Philistines had already the three characteristics that marked
them out from the other nations round about. The adjective 'un-
circumcised ', obviously the current term of abuse in all generations,
already makes its appearance. Their peculiar government by ' lords '
also meets us, but as it happens no particular ' lord ' is named, nor
does the Samson story give us any idea of their number. Thirdly, in
the final scene, we are introduced to the mysterious Dagon, the chief
deity of the Philistine pantheon.

For how long the Philistine domination lasted we have no means
of knowing. There is no indication of the length of time supposed
to elapse between the death of Samson and the a])pearance on the
scene of Samuel. Eli, the priest of the High Place at Shiloh, may
or may not have been contemporary with Samson : he a})pears
suddenly on the scene as a man in extreme old age ' who had judged
Israel forty years', and vanishes almost immediately.

The next stage of the history shows us the disunited and mutually
hostile tribes of Israel gradually welding together under the pressure
of their formidable enemy, and slowly but surely, though with more
than one serious set-back, reversing the situation.

We begin with the unlucky battle in which for a time the Ark was
lost (1 Sam. iv). The to})ography of the battle is uncertain : the
Philistines pitched at a place (|uite unknown, Aphek, the Israelites

' Thus, it is only by a foot-note, as it were, that we learn that Joseph employed an
interpreter in conversing with his brethren.

THE HISTORY OF THE IMHLISTINES 47

at a spot of e(jually obscure topography, Eben-ezer, where Samuel
afterwards set up a memorial pillar (vii. 12), The Philistines wore
the victors, and the Israelites attempted to turn the battle l)y fetching
their national palladium from its resting-place in Shiloh. The Philis-
tines were at first stricken with a superstitious fear ; but recovering
themselves they made a complete slaughter of the Israelites, and
captured the Ai-k itself. Their rallying-cry 'Be strong and be men,
that ye be not slaves to the Hebrews as they have been to you ' cor-
roborates, from the Philistine side, the evidence that the Philistines
were the masters of the Hebrews at the time.

Now begins that strange story of the Avandcrings of the Ark. It
would be natural to lay up the symbol of the deity of a van(|uished
people in the temple of the chief god of the conquerors : as Alesha
laid up his religious trophies before Chemosh, so the Ark was de])osited
in the temple of Dagon at Ashdod — a temple of which we hear down
to the time of the Maccabees (1 Mace. x. 84). But Dagon twice
falls prostrate before the Ark, the second time being broken by
the fall. At the same time a plague of mice or rats spread over the
Philistine plain. There Avas a very similar plague over the same
district in 1904, and enormous damage was done to the growing-
crops. Indeed, the peasants, whose fields were robbed almost as
though bv the prophet Joel's locusts, were reduced to tracking out
the rat-holes and collecting the grain that the animals had brought
down and stored : it was a curious sight to watch the women patiently
engaged in this weary work, and gradually filling bags with the
precious seed thus recovered. But in the Philistine experience
the plague of rats had a yet more serious consequence. Not only
did they ' mar the land ', but as we now know to be the natural
course of events, the parasites of the mice communicated to the
people the disease of bubonic plague.^

The disease broke out first in Ashdod, and was naturally explained
as due to the presence of the Ark. They therefore dispatched it to
Gath, and of course the bearers carried the plague bacilli with them :
again it was sent to Ekron, and again the plague was carried thither ;

^ Some commentators (e. g. H. P. Smith in the International Critical Commentary),
while recognizing that the disease was plague, have missed the essential significance
of the mice, and would remove them altogether as ' late redactional insertion '.
Although in the Hebrew received text, as reproduced in the English Bible, the
' mice ' come in awkwardly as though a sudden afterthought, the Greek Version
makes them much more prominent throughout the narrative ; and there is no
possible reason why any redactor (unless he had divined some of the most recent
discoveries in bacteriology) should have introduced mice into the story at all. The
distorted version of the plague which destroyed Sennacherib's army, recorded in
Herodotus ii. 141, also introduces mice very conspicuously.

48 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

and as the Philistines, even before they had secured their costly prize,
had associated it with outbreaks of pestilence in Egypt (1 Sam. iv. 8),
they easily connected it with their own troubles. How they returned
it to Beth-Shemesh, and how the bacilli (carried probably by para-
sites on the kine, or perhaps on the coverings of the Ark) proved to
be still virulent to the cost of the villagers who too rashly approached,
are tales too well know n to need repetition.

It is interesting that the Philistines sent back with the Ark votive
models of their twofold plague, which yet was one, as their ancestors
had been wont to do when, in search of healing from the ills of human
flesh, they visited the Dictaean Cave in the ancient homeland.

The following chapter (vii) apparently represents a different strand
of tradition. According to this the Ark was suffered to remain in
Kiriath-Jearim no less than twenty years, until, proliably, it was
brought up to Jerusalem at the beginning of the reign of David.^
Samuel held a reconciliation service, as it might be called, in which
Israel renounced the various strange gods they had adopted. The
l^hilistines came up to plunder this peaceful assembly, but were
driven back by an appalling thunderstorm. The people gave chase,
and smote the invaders to the unknown place called Beth-Car, to
which reference has been made in the previous chapter ; and a great
memorial stone was set up at or near the spot where the Ark had
been captured. We are then told that the Philistines restored certain
cities, including Ekron and Gath (or according to the Greek text,
Ashkelon and ' Azob \ i. e. Gaza or Ashdod), to the Israelites, and
that they never again came up to invade Israel.

It is noticeable that the narrator, with all his desire to glorify
Samuel, avoids making a purely military leader of him, while
emjihasizing his religious functions. The victory is ascribed more to
the thunderstorm, which is an answer to the ' whole burnt offering '
offered by Sanuiel, than to military skill on the part of the Israelites
or of any leader. The writer's patriotic enthusiasm (and perhaps
some such record as Judges i. 18) have betrayed him into exaggeration
with reirard to the ' restoration ' of cities that in fact had never
been Isi-aelite. But with regard to his conclusion 'that the Philistines
never again invaded Israel", it is (|uite })()ssiljle to judge him too
harshly. If the Pliilistiiies were confined to the narrow strip of
territory from Joppa southward, the statement would be absurd : but
we have now seen that, at the time, the suzerainty of the Philistines

' The data for the ehronologj^ of Saul's reign are notoriously insuffieient. Note
that Eli's great-grandson was priest in Sliiloh at the time of the battle of Michmash
(1 Sara. xiv. 3).

THE HISTORY OF THE IMHEISTINES 49

over the whole of Palestine wus complete, ami that in all probability
they actually occupied the Northrn coast, the plain of Esdraelon as far
as the Jordan, and even penetrated up the fertile valleys that wind
through the Judacan mountains. This being so it may well be that
the incident here recorded was actually the last case of aggression ; but
that in all the other cases in which the IMiilistines ' came up to war '
the purpose was defensive, to meet Israelite encroachments on their
territory. The passage therefore is not necessarily so ' extravagant '
as some critics have made out.

However, there can be little doubt that the desire of the Hebrew
people for a king, which now began to express itself, was the natural
outcome of the growing sense of unity which under the pressure of the
Philistine domination was rapidly developing. A leader was urgently
needed who should be free from the specitically religious duties to
which Samuel Avas entirely devoted ; it was hoped that one who could
thus give his whole attention to military )natters might ultimately rid
the people of the yoke that daily became more and more intolerable.
Authorities differ as to how Samuel was affected by the popular
demand. In one version he indignantly condemned it as a revolt
against the theocracy of which he himself was at once Emperor and
Pope. In another version he raised no objection to the new
departure, definitely recognized it as a step towards delivery from
the Philistines (1 Sam. ix. 16), chose the king and received him
courteously, and declared to him the signs that testified to his
election. From this progranmie we learn incidentally that the
Philistines had a sort of mudir or governor at a place called Gibeah
of God (probably to be identified with the modern village of Ram
Allah about twelve miles north of Jerusalem).^ This fact underlines,
so to speak, what has already been said about the absence of Philistine
aggressions after the battle of Beth-Car. AVith an outpost so far
east as the spot indicated, the actual territory of the Philistines
included all the places where fighting took place.

Saul assumed the kingdom, and immediately the first Israelite
aggression took place: Jonathan slew the Philistine governor of Geba,
where, as at Gibeah, there seems to have been a Philistine mudir.

The Philistines, rightly considering this a sign of revolt, came up
to quell the insurrection. The Israelites were gathered together with
Saul in Michmash,^ but when they saw the overpowering might of the

' In the English version (1 Sam. x. j) the word 3''VJ, which in 1 Kings iv. 19 and
elsewhere means 'a prefect or officer', is translated, probably wrongly, 'camp'.

^2 There are some difficulties of interpretation and other critical complications in
the passage, on which sec the standard commentators.

50 THE SCIIWEICH LECTURES, 1911

Philistines swooping down upon them they hid themselves in the
caves with which the country abounds. Saul waited anxiously for
Samuel, and at last ventured himself to offer the necessary sacrifices :
the denunciation, with which the stern old prophet expressed his
resentment at this usurpation of his priestly functions, was apparently
the first shock that disturbed SauPs delicately poised mental
equilibrium, and paved the wav for the insanity by which he was
afterwards afflicted.

Jonathan again came to the rescue. With his armour-bearer he
showed himself to the Philistines encamped at Michmash. They
called to him to 'come up and see something'— note again that
difference of language was no bar to intercourse — and the two young
men, who had previously agreed to take such an invitation as an
omen, climlDcd up to the camp. In some way they succeeded in
throwing the camp into confusion, as Gideon had done with the
Midianites. Soon the Philistines broke into a panic, which a timely
earthquake intensified, and before long thev were in flight, with the
armies of Israel in hot pursuit. It is a remarkable story, and still
more remarkable is the pendant — the tabu put by Saul on food, which
had the natural result of making the victory less complete : the
unconscious violation of the tabu by Jonathan : the consequent silence
of the Divine oracle : his trial and condenniation : his redemption, no
doubt by the substitution of another life : the pouring out of the
blood when the tabu came to an end — all these are pictures of ancient
religious custom and belief of the highest value.

The familiar story of the battle of Ephes-Dammim, with its central
incident — the duel of David and Goliath — is the next scene in the
drama. For the present, however, we pass it over : it is involved in
a host of difficulties. Whatever view may be taken of the story, as
we have it, it is evident that neither the spirit nor the power of the
Philistines was broken by the rout at Michmash, but that they were
able to meet Israel again soon after David's introduction to the court
of Saul. David distinguished himself so as to arouse the jealousv of
Saul, now rapidly falling into the morbid mental state that clouded
his last days ; and to that jealousy was due the exile of David in the
wilderness.

With a madman's cunning, Saul at first attempted to work David's
destruction by guile : he bribed him with the offer of his daughter's
hand to go and bring him proof that he had slain a hundred of the
uncircumcised — the trick was not unlike that which in later years
David himself played on Uriah the Ilittite. David, however, was more
fortunate than his own victim, and fullilUd the tusk imposed on him.

THE HISTORY OF THE PHHJSTINES 51

But Saul's jealousy still pursued him, and lie became a ccnnplete
outlaw. His life during this period as narrated consists of a series of
episodes, more or less disconnected. On one occasion he goes to the
sanctuary at Nob, on the slope of the Mount of Olives (as we learn from
Isa. X. 32), and takes the sword of Goliath thence to serve him as
a weapon : we are tiien surprised to find him fleeing with this equip-
ment to Gath, of all places — but probably the two incidents should
not follow consecutively. At Gatii he is recognized, and to avoid
unpleasant consequences feigns insanity. This affliction would in
Semitic circles secure him a measure of inviolability — the uncanny
manifestations of mental derangement or degeneracy ])eing curiously
mixed up with notions of ' holiness'. But Achish, the dignified though
simple-minded lord of Gath, was not a Semite, and had no such
superstitions. He is almost modern in his protests — ' If you see a
madman, why do you bring him to me.'' I want no madmen about
me, and I will not have him in my house ! '^ We almost hear an echo
of the sarcasms of Zakar-Baal.

All through the story of David's outlawry raids of the Philistines
run like a thread : and it must then, if never before, have been
impressed upon him that when he came into his kingdom his first
care must be to crush these troublesome neighbours finally and for
ever. Now we read of his band saving the threshing-floors of Keilah
from Philistine marauders : soon afterwards a Philistine raid breaks
off negotiations between Saul and the men of Ziph for the betrayal of
David.

But at last David, in despair of ever effecting a reconcilement with
the insane Hebrew king, threw in his lot with the Philistines. Once
more he comes to Gath — or, rather, we have probably a second version
of the one incident, omitting the essential detail of the feigned mad-
ness. Here he was safe from Saul : but he did not stay very long.
Probably (as in the previous version of the story) he found Gatii
uncomfortable as a place of residence, with his record of Philistine
slaughter. So in Oriental wise he dissembled, and, flattering the
king by pretending to be unworthy of living in the same city with
him, he persuaded him to purchase his vassalage by putting Ziklag at
his disposal. From this centre he raided various Bedawin camps,
and, presenting the booty to his new master, he pretended that lie

1 Tlic notion of a commentator, that Achish's protest M'as due to his being
already troubled with insanity in his family, deserves a place in the same cabinet
of curiosities with the speculations of the ancient blockliead who supposed that
when Our Lord wrote with His finger on the ground ^John viii. (i He was
making a catalogue of the secret sins of the bystanders !

52 THE SCinVEICH LECTURES, 1911

had been attacking his own people. Thereby he gained the confi-
dence of Achish, and no doubt acquired much serviceable informa-
tion about Philistine military methods and resources.

Meanwhile the tragedy of Saul Avas working; to its close. The Philis-
tines were preparing for a final blow that would wipe off their recent
reverses. Achish wished David, whom he blindly trusted, to accom-
pany him as leader of his body-guard ; but in this his wiser colleagues
overruled him. They had already learnt, in the battle of Michmash,
that the ' Hebrews that were with the Philistines ' were not to be
trusted when the battle went against tlieir masters (1 Sam. xiv. 21).
So Achish sent David away, with a dignified courtesy which contrasts
pleasingly with the duplicity, not to say treachery, of his protege.^
David accordingly departed to his own quarters, and while the battle
of Gilboa was being Avon and lost he was kept busy in aA'enging the
raid which during his absence the Bedawin had very naturally made
on Ziklag.

The armour of the dead Saul Avas hung in the house of Ashtoreth,
and his body Avas fastened on the Avail of Beth- Shan, the modern
Beisan — a place close to the banks of the Jordan. This further
corroborates the conclusion already indicated as to the Avide exten-
sion of Philistine territory. For they would hardly have put the
trophy Avhere they could not reasonably have expected to retain it.-

For the seven years of Dayid's reign in Hebron the Philistines gave
him no trouble. No doubt he continued to acknoAvledge himself as
vassal of Achish, or of the Philistine oligarchy at large. MeauAvhile
Ish-baal (Ish-bosheth), SauPs son, guided and directed by Abner, set
up a kingdom across Jordan, Avith its centre at Mahanaim : and the
land of Ephraim remained subject to the Philistines, In the last
tAvo years of Ish-baal's life he extended his kingdom, doubtless under
Philistine suzerainty, to Ephraim as Avell : an arrangement terminated
by the defection of Abner to David and by his own assassination.
This event left the Avay open for David to enlarge his borders, and to
unite under his single sAvay the discordant elements of Judah and
Ephraim. The ever-vigilant foes, not being Avilling to tolerate so

' No doubt there was a certain element of policy in Achish's hospitality : David
being the known rival of the Hebrew king, it probably seemed desirable to foment
the division between them. Winckler (Oesch. Isr., p. 22+) says iex cathedra !) " Was
uber Davids Aufenthalt an seinem Hofe gesa-t wird, ist Fabel'. This sort of
negative credulity is just as bad science as the positive credulity Avhich swallows
whole all the fancies of historical myth-makers.

2 Unless, indeed, we are to identify this Beth-Shan with the unknown ' Shen ',
mentioned in the corrupt passage 1 Sam. vii. 12.

THE HISTORY OF THE PHILISTINES 53

large an increase in the strength of a suhonHiiate, then came up
against him.^

Three battles, disastrous to the Philistines, are recorded as taking
place early in David's reign over the united kingdoms. But the
accounts of them are scanty and confused, and require careful
examination. The following are the outline accounts of them which
the author of the Book of Samuel transmits :

A. The Battle of Baal-Pem::hn.

' And when the Philistines heard that they had anointed David
king over Israel, all the Philistines went up to seek David ; and
David heard of it, and went down to the hold.-^ Now the Philistines
had come and spread themselves in the valley of Rephaim. And
David inquired of Yahweh, saying. Shall I go up against the Philis-
tines ? Wilt thou deliver them into mine hand ? And Yahweh said
unto David, Go up : for I will certainly deliver the Philistines into
thine hand. And David came to Baal-Perazim, and David smote
them there; and he said, Yahweh hath broken mine enemies Ijefore
me, like the breach of waters. Therefore he called the name of that
place Baal-Perazim. And they left their images there, and David and
his men took them away.'' — 2 Samuel v. 17-21.

B. The Battle of Geba.

•And the Philistines came up yet again, and spread themselves in
the valley of Rephaim. And when David inquired of Yahweh, he
said. Thou shalt not go up : make a circuit behind them, and
come upon them over against the balsams. And it shall be, when
thou hearest the sound of marching in the tops of the balsams, that
then thou shalt bestir thyself: for then is Yahweh gone out before thee
to smite the host of the Philistines. And David did so, as Yahweh
commanded him ; and smote the Philistines from Geba until thou
come to Gezer.'— 2 Samuel v. 22 25.

C. The Battle of ( ?)

' And after this it came to pass, that David smote the Philistines,
and subdued them : and David took ( ) out of the hand of the

Philistines."' — 2 Sam. viii. 1.

1 For a discussion of the obscure period of the dual reign of David and Isli-haai,
with special reference to the problem of the reconcilement of David's seven and
a half years with Ish-bosheth's two years, see the important article by Kanii)hausen,
Philister iind Hebrder zur Zeit Davids, in Zeitsch. f. d. allffsl. Wisseuscli. ^1886;,
vi, p. 4i.

- Hardly Advillam, as some conmicntators have supposed. Did the Adullam life
continue after David was anointed king on Hebron ?

54 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

These outlinesniay to some small extentbe filled in from other sources.
The priestly writer of Clironicles is careful to add to the account of
the first battle that the idols of the Philistines, captured after the
rout, were burnt with fire (1 Chron. xiv. S-lIii). The site of Baal-
Perazim is unknown. It seems to be mentioned again in Isaiah xxviii. 21,
in connexion with G'iheon : perhaps this passage refers to the first two
battles. In the account of the second battle the Chronicler likewise
substitutes Gibeon for Geba (1 Chron. xiv. 13-16) : while in the third,
instead of an unintelligible expression in the version of Samuel, he
has ' David took Gath and her towns out of the hand of the Philis-
tines' (xviii. ] ).

Among these battles must probably be fitted some scraps of biography
that now find a place much later both in Samuel and in Chronicles. They
are confused and corrupt, but are to the effect that at certain specified
places, certain Philistine champions were slain by certain of the mighty
men of David.

The first is the familiar tale of David and Goliath, which we passed
over a while ago, and which cannot be dissociated from these fragments.
David is sent by his father to the battle-field of Ephcs-Danmiim, to
bring supplies to his elder brothers. His indignation is roused by
a gigantic Philistine champion named Goliath of Gath, who challenges
the Israelites to provide one who shall fight with him and decide the
battle by single combat. The champion is minutely described : he was
somewhere between nine and eleven feet high, with a helmet, a coat of
mail weighing 5,000 shekels, greaves and a javelin, all of bronze, as well
as an iron-pointed s])ear like a weaver''s beam. How David, though
a youth unable to wear armour, goes against the giant, exchanges
taunting speeches with hitn, and brings him down with his sling, are
tales too faniiliar to rehearse (1 Sam. xvii).

The difficulties of the passage are many. The inconsistency of
David, already (ch. xvi. 21 ) the armour-bearer of Saul, being now totally
uiik)iown to him, has heen a crux to the haniioiiists of all generations :
though tliis difficultv is evaded by an imjjortant group of the Greek
MSS., whicli omit bodily verses xvii. 12 Jil, 55-xviii. 5 — that is, every-
thing inconsistent with David"'s being already at court and known to
Saul. The omitted verses are ])robably fragments of another parallel
narrative. But even then we are not quite free from troubles. The
whole machinery of the ordeal by duel recalls incidents of the Trojan
war, or the tale of the Horatii and Curiatii, rather than what we are
accustomed to look for in Semitic warfare; David's improbable flight
to Gath soon after the battle has already been commented upon ; and,
as will presently be seen, we possess another account of the battle of

thp: history of the phhjstines 55

Ephe.s-D.'uiimim, wliith i> (|uitc inconsistent with tliu (ioliatli story,
and, indeed, leaves no room lor it.

The second fra<fmentarv narration is unfortunatelv found in Samuel
only (2 Sam. xxi. 15 17). It reads 'And the I'hilistines had war a<rain
with Israel; and David went down, and his servants with him, and fought
against the Philistines : and David waxed faint. And (a champion)
which was of the sons of Kapha, the weight of whose spear was (300
(shekels) of bronze in weight, he being girtled with a new [word lost],
thought to have slain David. But Abishai the son of Zeruiah succoured
him and smote the Philistine and killed liim. Then the men of David
sware unto him, saying, " Thou shalt go no more out with us to battle,
that thou quench not the lamp of Israel."' '

The rendering ' a champion ' is suggested for tiie unintelligible 13*J'^
2J3, treated as a proper name ' Ishbi-benob ' in the English version.
As it stands it means ' and they dwelt in Nob \ which clearly makes no
sense ; and the emendation that is most current— by the change of one
letter, turning Xob to Gob, and moving the phrase so as to follow
'and his servants with him ' in the previous sentence — is not altogether
satisfactorv. For * Gob ' itself is probably, as we shall see, corrupt ;
and it is hard to see how the sentence could have been transposed from
a place where it makes passable sense to a place where it makes com-
plete nonsense. The reading here suggested is C"'Jnn"*j"N, literally ' man
of the betweens ', apparently a technical term for a champion, which is
actuallv applied to Goliath in 1 Samuel xvii. Though differing in detail,
and transmitted in a garbled form, the general resemblance of the
description of the equipment of this warrior to that of Goliath is too
striking to be overlooked ; and we are thus led to wonder whether this
may not be a version of the Goliath story in which the issue of the duel
was very nearly the reverse of that in the familiar narrative. One is
also tempted to ask whether in the 'oath' of the men of David (for
which compare 2 Sam. xviii. 3) we are to see an explanation of David's
having stayed in Jerusalem while Joab was acting for the king in his
operations against the Annnonites, w ith the disastrous consequence of
the episode of Bath-Sheba. If this oath is to be literally understood,
this incident of the champion slain by David's nephew must belong to
the end of David's operations against the Philistines, all of w hich seem
to have been directed by the king in person.

The third fragment ajipears in both 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles.
The Samuel version says 'And it came to pass after this, that there
was asain war with the Philistines at Gob : then Sibbecai the Husha-
thite slew Saph, which was of the sons of Itaj^ha. And tliere was again
war with the Philistines at Gob ; and Elhanan the son of Jaare-oregim

56 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

the Beth-leheniite slew Goliath the Gittite, the stafi' of whose] spear
was like a weaver's beam' (2 Sam. xxi. 18, 19).

In the parallel account (1 Chron. xx. 4), Gezer is substituted for
Gob, Sippai for Saph, Jair for Jaare-oregim, and ' slew Lahmi the
brother of Goliath ' for ' the Beth-leheniite slew Goliath \

With regard to the first of these divergencies, it should be noticed
that the place-name ' Gob "" is not mentioned elsewhere. Following
Clermont-Ganneau I was formerly inclined to accept Gezer as the
correct reading — -the change would be easy, in for m: — but I now
see two formidable difficulties. In the first place, it is not likely that
the well-known place-name Gezer would be corrupted to a name
utterly unknown : in the second, the name ' Gob ' is written iij in
both places, without the mater leciioms which the emendation sug-
gested requires. Noting that in the text in Samuel the name ' Gob '
is in botli places followed by a word beginning with the letter y,
I would now suggest that a second V has dropped out in both places,
and that for Gob we are to read y33, Geba.^ The advantage of this
correction is, that it would make both the Samuel and Chronicles
versions right, and would show us where to fit the fragment under
discussion. For we can scarcely avoid connecting an incident, said in
one version to take place at Geba, and in another version at Gezer,
with a battle which is definitely stated to have begun in one of these
two places and finished in the other. The deaths of Saph and of
Goliath therefore took place in the second of the three battles
enumerated above (p. 53).

The other divergencies need not detain us so long. The question
of the spelling of the champion's name is scarcely important : yet it is
tempting to inquire whether the form in Chronicles, "laD, is not to
be preferred, and, further, whether it may not be that it actually finds
an echo to this day in the commonplace Arabic name Tell es-SaJi,
commonly rendered ' The clear mound V" whereby the most probable
site of fuicient Gath is now known. Jair for Jaare-oregim is certainly
right, the latter half of the name as given by Samuel being a ditto-
graphy of the word 'weaver's beam'' in the next line; on the other
hand, the Chronicler's evolution of (yoliath's brother Lahmi out of the
name of Jair's native place is obviously some scril)e"s attempt to get
rid of an evident harmonistic difficulty.

The fourth fragment follows the last in both places. ' And there
was again war at Gath, where was a man of gi-eat stature, that had on

' The Greek and Pesliitta \er.sions read Gath.

2 But really meanirifi^, if anythinj?, 'The mound of the clear one.' 'The clear
mound ' would be Et-tell ex-SOJi.

THE HISTORY OF THE PHILISTINES 57

every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four and twenty iu
number ; and he also was born to Kapha. And when he defied Israel,
Jonathan the son of Shiniei David's brother slew him. Tiiese four
were born to Uapha in Gath ; and they fell by the hand of David, and
by the hand of his servants.' The Chroiiiclei's version is substantially
identical.

Let us now trv to dovetail these seemingly incoherent frag-
ments into a consistent narrative. Nearlv all of them will be found
to hang together with a logical connexion between them. AVe begin
Avith the story of Jesse sending David as a youth to his brothers, and
their surly reception of him, in some campaign. This story, though, as
we have seen, it almost makes nonsense of the place where it is found, is
so graphic and circumstantial that it cannot lightly be thrown aside. It
is not improbable, ho" ever, that it was by his musical rather than his
military ability that lie attracted attention on this occasion, and was
brought to the notice of Saul and Jonathan (1 Sam. xvi. 14-18, xviii. 1).
At first he was received kindly, and made SauFs armour-bearer.

Then came the battle of Ephes-Dammim, the full account of which
is lost. But by combining 2 Samuel xxiii. 9 with 1 Chronicles xi. 13,
two mutilated but complementary passages, we can gain some idea of
what happened. The Philistines came up to battle at Ephes-Dammim ;
the men of Israel fled ; but David, aided by Eleazer the son of Dodo
the Ahohite (whatever that may mean), held them ' in the valley
between Shocoh and Azekah ' and fought till their hands clave to their
swords. They succeeded in turning the victory, and the people came
back ' only to spoil \ Well might the maidens, after such an exhibi-
tion of valour, sing that ' Saul had slain thousands but David had slain
myriads \ The folk-tale of a giant-killing shepherd-boy, coloured by
some actual incident of David's later campaigns, has been substituted
for the less picturesque story of the battle : a relic of the excised j)art
may possibly be seen in the verse inserted after 1 Samuel xix. 7 : ' And
there was war again : and David went out, and fought with the Philis-
tines, and slew them w ith a great slaughter ; anil they fled before him.'
And when the tribes of Israel came to David to make him king, they
remind him that even in Saul's lifetime it was he who used to lead
them out to war (2 Sam. v. 2).

The triumph-song of the women roused the jealousy of Saul, and he
drove David into exile. The other tales of Philistine routs, which
meet us in the lists of David's mighty men, appear to relate to the
time of the outlawry. Shammah's defence of the lentil-lield, to which
reference has already been made, was of the same order as the repulse
of the raid on the threshin<«;.Hoor of Keilah : the breaking through the

58 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

Philistine camp at Rephaini by the three heroes, in quest of the Beth-
lehem water, is definitely assigned to the Adullam period. Finally
David took service in Gath, and became thoroughly acquainted with
that important city.

When the kingdoms of Judah and Israel Avere united, the Philistines
came to break up his power ; and three engagements were fought, all
disastrous to the hereditary enemies of the Hebrews. The first was the
battle of Baal-Perazim, of which Me have no particulars save the picture
of a hurried flight in which even the idols were left behind. The
second, that of Geba, is more interesting. The incident of the oracle
of the sacred trees is one of the many noteworthy landmarks in Old
Testament religion. The topography of the battle seems at first sight
difficult to follow : but it works out easily when one knows the con-
figuration of the ground. The valley or plain of Rephaim is usually
etjuated with the Ijroad expanse that lies south-west of Jerusalem.
Geba was some four miles to the north of the city. What must have
happened was, that David's men circled behind the Philistine camp,
under cover, probably, of the hills to the west of the plain (now
crowned by the Greek Patriarch's summer residence Kat'emon);
that is, down the picturesque valley in which stands the Convent of
tlie Cross, Then crossing into the Wady el-AVerd by the site of the
modern village of Malhah,^ they attacked the Philistines on the rear.
Finding their retreat (down the present Wady el-Werd and its
western continuation, the Wady es-Surar) cut off', the Philistines fled
northward, past Jerusalem, as far as the village of Geba, and then
rushed down the valley of Aijalon, which opens out on the coast -plain
not far from Gezer. Some time in this battle or the subsequent rout
Sibbecai (or Mebunni) slew Sajjh, and Elhanan slew Goliath.

Contrary to most modern commentators I assume that this raid
of the Philistines took place after (or perhaps durinff, which is not
iniprobaljle) David's successful siege of Jerusalem. If David was
still in Hebron at the time, I cannot conceive what the Philistines
were doing in the valley of Re})haim. They would have come up
one of the more southerly valleys to attack him.

Lastly took place the final and decisive victory which crushed
for ever the Philistine suzerainty. The union at last effected among
the tribes of Israel gave them a strength they had never had before ;
yet it is hard to understand the comj)lete collapse of the people who
had been all-powerful but a few years previously. W. Max Miiller

' They must in this case have passi-d close by some ancient tumuli, which stand
west of Malhali : possibly the sacred balsara-trees were associated with tliese.

THE HISTORY OF THE PIHLISTINES

attempts to account for it^ by ;ui unrecorded attack ot" the Egyptian
king, whereby he possessed himself of the l*hilistine coastland :
arguing that in a list of Sheshonk"'s concpicsts in his campaign

y < of ^ 'Jip- ^0 ^

G-e-bcL. »

Fiir. 2. Sketfli-map to iUu>tratc the Battk- of (u-lia.

recorded in 1 Kings xiv. 25 no Philistine city is mentioned, for the
simple reason that they must have been already in Egyptian hands.
On this theory also he accounts for the capture of Gezer (an extension
of the Egyptian territory) recorded in 1 Kings ix. 16.
1 Asien und Europa, pp. 389, 390.

60 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

The site of the h^st battle is successfully concealed under a hopeless
corruption of the text. We are told in Samuel that David took
Metheg lut-amviah out of the hand of the Philistines : a phrase that
means ' bridle of the cubit ' or ' of the metropolis ', but defies con-
vincing explanation or emendation. The old versions all presuppose
an identical or similar text : Chronicles has ' Gath and her suburbs '.
which is probablv a guess at a reading w hich should be at least intelli-
gible. It cannot be right, for we find Gath still independent under
its king Achish at the beginning of Solomon's reign (1 Kings ii. 39).^
This, however, does not forbid our supposing the decisive battle to
have taken place at or near Gath : a verv likely place for David
to attack, as he was no doubt fiimiliar with its fortifications. There
certainly appears to have been a battle at Gath where the unnamed
polydactylous champion defied Israel and was slain by a nephew of
David. Perhaps he was one and the same with the Gittite champion
whom the English version calls Ishbi-benob, and from whom David,
when hard pressed, was rescued likewise by one of his nephews. In
this incident, on the theory here put forward, is the historical basis
of the David and Goliath story. In this case 2 Samuel xxi. 22 ('these
four were born to "the giant" in Gath") would be an editorial note.
Before leaving this record of the champions of the Philistines
which we have thus endea^ oured to put into order, we nuist notice
that, strictly speaking, thev are not to be classed as Philistines at all.
The expression 'son of Kapha', translated 'giant' in the English
version, implies rather that the family were of the remnant of the
Kephaites or Anakim, the tall aboriginal race which the Israelites on
their coming found established in Hebron and neighbouring villages,
Gath, Gaza, and Ashdod. According to Joshua xi. 21 they were driven
out utterly from the Hebron district, but a renniant was left in the
Philistine towns, where no doubt they mingled with the western new-
comers. The tall stature attributed to these ' champions ' — a physical
feature never ascribed in the history to the Philistines themselves- —

' It is })Ossible that David showed kindness to Achish, in return for tiie kindness
he had received from liini, and allowed him to continue in his kingdom under
vassalage. But this is jn-rhaps hardly i)robable : and evidently the runaway
servants of Shimei thought that they would be out of their master's reach in Gath,
so that that town was most likely (juite independent of Jerusalem.

^ I may quote from Thti Excavatian of Gezcr, vol. i, p. (il, the descriptions of the
only bones that have yet been found in Palestine which can be called ' Philistine '
with reasonable probability. Thej' ' are comparable with the types of ancient
Cretan bones described by Duckworth and Hawes, and with Cretan bones in the
Cambridge Museum. They represent a people of fairly tall stature (the man in
grave 2 was ."/ lo", that in grave 'i was «i' :i\"). They were probably about or under
40 years of age. In all the femora were not pilastcred and the tibiae not platy-

THE HISTORY OF THE rHH.ISTINES 61

fits in with this theory of the origin of the family. By Delilah
and Goliath the Philistine nation is judged: but there is no proof
that there was a drop of rhilistine blood in either the one or the
other.

The counnentators agree that the ancient psalm incorporated in
Psalm Ix. (8-12) and cviii. (7-10) can be as old as David. If so,
it may well have been a paean of the victory over the Philistines and
the other neighbouring nations.

That the Philistine power was utterly broken is shown by the
significant fact that in the distractions which vexed the later years
of David — the revolt of Absalom and of Shcba — they made no effort
to recover their lost ground. Quite the contrary : we are surprised
to find David's body-guard consisting of ' Cherethites and Pelethites ',
Cretans and Phili(s)tines : a Gittite called Obed-Edom houses the
ark when the ill-omened incident of Uzza had interrupted the first
attempt to bring it to Jerusalem : and another Gittite, Ittai by
name, was one of the few people who remained faithful to David
when Absalom had stolen the hearts of his followers. So their
ancient kinsmen the Shardanu appear, now as enemies, now as loyal
mercenaries of Egypt. And in the later history, except a few half-
hearted attempts like that in the time of Jehoram, the Philistines
took no decisive advantage of the internal dissensions between Judah
and Israel, or of their many struggles with the Syrians and other
foreign foes. From the time of David their power, and indeed their
very individuality, dwindle away with a rapidity difficult to parallel.
The contrast between the pre-Davidic and the post-Davidic Philistines
is one of the most extraordinary in human history.

But in Palestine the Philistines were, after all, foreigners: they
had come from their healthy maritime life to the fever-haunted and
sirocco-blasted land of Canaan. The climate of that country guards
it for its Semitic heirs, and Philistine and Crusader alike nmst submit
to the laws of human limitations.

The Philistine body-guard above referred to was perhaps organized
during David's stay in Ziklag. In the later history some traces of
the organization seem to survive. The ' Carites ■", as they are now
significantly called, help Jehoiada to put down the usurping queen
Athaliah. In Ezekiel (xliv. 7 sqq.) there is a prophecy against

cnemic. The skulls were ellipsoidal, mesaticephalic, orthognathous, raegaserae
(with wide orbits^ mesorrhine (with moderately wide nose), and microdont. The
female skuU in grave 4 was a little wider in proportion, and though the teeth were
moderately small, the incisors projected forward, though not enough to make the
face prognathous. The lower teeth were also very oblique.'

62 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

certain uncircumcised foreigners who are introduced, apparently in
some official capacity, into the Temple : and in Zephaniah i. 8, 9
'those that are clothed with foreign apparel' and 'those that leap
over the threshold ' in the ' day of the Lord's sacrifice ' are denounced.
Though suggestive, neither of these passages is as clear as we should
like : the possibility of there being some connexion between the
threshold rite in Zephaniah and the analogous rite in the Temple
of Ashdod (1 Sam. v. 5) has often been noticed. It is an interesting
possibility — we cannot say more — that there actually was a Philistine
body-guard round the king and his court at Jerusalem, and that
the Temple itself, built as we shall see after a Philistine model, was
protected by Philistine janissaries. This might explain the unex-
pected reappearance of the heathenish name of Sisera among the
Nethinim or Temple servitors recorded in Ezra ii. 53, Nehemiah vii. 55.

IIL Their Decuxe and Disappearaxce.

A few simple figures will show the comparative insignificance into
which the Philistines fell after their wars with David. In the first
book of Samuel, the name ' Philistine ' or ' Philistines ' occurs
125 times. In the second book it occurs only twenty-four times,
and some of these are reminiscent passages, referring to earlier inci-
dents. In the two books of the Kings too-ether the name occurs onlv
six times.

Achish was still 'King of Gath', as we have already seen, at the
beginning of Solomon's reign, and the coastland strip was still
outside Hebrew territory. Gezer was presented to Solomon's wife
as a marriage portion. After the partition of the kingdom, Nadab
son of Jeroboam I besieged Gibbetlion, a now unknown Philistine
village, w'here he was killed by his successor Baasha. The siege
was apparently renewed at the end of Baasha's own reign, but why
this village was made a centre of attack is a question as obscure
as its topography. Ahaziah sent to consult the Oracle of Ekron.
The Shunammite woman who had entertained Elisha sojourned during
the seven years' famine in the land of the Philistines — a testimony
to the superior fertility of that part of the country. Turning to
the records of the southern kingdom, we learn from the Chronicler
that certain of the Philistines brought presents and silver for tribute
to Jehoshaphat : but that under his son Jehoram they revolted and
carried away his sul)stance. In the parallel version in Kings the
revolt is localized in the insignificant town of Libnah. The great
king Uzziah, on the other hand, broke the walls of Gath — which
had probably been already weakened by the raid of Hazael of Syria

THE HISTORY OF ^rilE mnUSTINES 63

(2 Kings xii. 18) — as well as the walls of Jabnch and of Ashdod,
and established cities of his own in Philistine territory. This is
the last we hear of the important city of Gath in history : henceforth
it is omitted from the enumerations of Philistine cities in prophetic
denunciations of the race. In the time of Ahaz there seems to have
been a revival of the old spirit among the beaten people. Profiting
by the Edomite raid which already harassed Judah, they took
some cities from Southern Judah, including Beth-shemesh, Aijalon,
Gederoth, Shocho, Tinniath, and Gimzo, which are not elsewhere
reckoned as Philistine property (2 Chron. xxviii. 18) ; certainly the
first of these was a Hebrew village even at the time of the greatest
extension of Philistine power. This ' Philistine revival ' seems to
have inspired Isaiah in a denunciation of Ephraim (Isa. ix. 12), but
whether the invasion of the northern kingdom there threatened ever
took place is not recorded. Probably not, as llezekiah once more
reversed the situation, smiting the Philistines as far as Gaza
(2 Kings xviii. 8).

At this point we glean some welcome details of history from the
annals of the Assyrian kings. Hadad-Nirari III (812-783) enumerates
the Philistines among the Palestinian states conquered by him about
803 M.C., but enters into no particulars. Tiglath-Pileser HI, however,
(745-727) gives us fuller details. Rezon (in the Hebrew Rezm) of
Syria, and Pekah of Samaria were in league, whereas Ahaz of
Jerusalem had become a vassal of the king of Assyria. The Philis-
tines had attached themselves to the Syrian league, so that in 734 b.c.
Tiglath-Pileser came up with the special purpose of sacking Gaza.
Hanunu, the king of Gaza, fled to Sebako, king of Egypt ; but he
afterwards returned and, having made submission, was received
with favour.^

Some four years earlier Mitinti, king of Ashkelon, had revolted,
trusting to the support of Rezon. But the death of Rezon so
terrified the king that he fell sick and died — possibly he poisoned
himself, knowing what punishment would be in store for him at the
hands of the ferocious Assyrian. His son Rukipti, who reigned in
his stead, hastened to make submission.

' • . . . The town of . . . over the land Beth-Oniri ... I cast its whole extent
under the rule of Assyria : I put my officials as lieutenants over it. Hanunu of
Gaza fled before my arms, and escaped to Egypt. Gaza I plundered, its posses-
sions and its gods . . . and I put my royal image (?;i in his palace. I laid the
service of the gods of his land under the service of Asshur. I laid tribute upon
hira ... As a bird he flew hither (made submission) and I set him again to his
place.' — Keilinschri/tliche Bibliothek, ii, pp. 3-2,33; Schrader, Keilinnchrifien^, p. 56.
See also Rost, Keilinschr. Tiglath-Pilesers, p. 78.

64 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

About 713 another Philistine city comes into prominence. This
is Ashdod, the king of which, Azuri, refused to pay tribute and
endeavoured to stir up the neighbouring princes to revolt. Sargon,
kingof Assyria (722-705), came down, expelled Azuri, and established
in his stead his brother Ahimiti. An attempt was made by the
Philistines — Sargon's scribe calls them Hittites — to substitute one
Yamani, who had no claim to the throne. But this bold usurper
fled to the land of Meluhha in N. Arabia when Sargon was on his
way to the city.^ These operations of Sargon against Ashdod are
referred to in a note of time in Isaiah xx. 1.

The next king, Sennacherib (705-681), had trouble with the
remnant of the Philistines. Mitinti's son Rukipti had been succeeded
by his son Sarludari, l)ut it seems as though this ruler had been
deposed, and a person called Zidka reigned in his stead. Sennacherib
found conspiracy in Zidka, and brought the gods of his father's house,
himself, and his family into exile to Assyria, restoring Sarludari to his
former throne, while of course retaining the suzerainty. In this
operation he took the cities of Beth-Dagon, Joppa, Bene-Berak, and
Azuri, which belonged to Zidka. These names still survive in the
villages of Beit Dejan, Ibrak, and Yazur, in the neighbourhood of
Jaffa.

At the same time the Ekronites had revolted against the
Assyrian. Their king, Padi, had remained a loyal vassal to his
overlord, but his turbulent sul)jects had put him in fetters and sent
him to Hezekiah, king of Judah, who cast him into prison. The
Ekronites summoned assistance from North Arabia and Egypt, and
met Sennacherib in El-Tekeh. Here they were defeated, and
Sennacherib marched against Ekron, slaying and impaling the chief
officers. Padi was rescued from Jerusalem, his deliverance being no
doubt part of the tribute paid by Hezekiah (2 Kings xviii. 14).

1 ' Azuri, king of Ashdod, devised in his heart to bring no more tribute, and sent
an invitation to the kings of his neighbourhood to hostility against Asshur. On
account of the misdeeds he wrought, I removed him from the lordshi]) of tlie people
of his land and put his brother Ahimiti in lordship over them. But evil-plotting
Hittites were hostile to his lordship and set over themselves Yamani, who had no
claim to the throne, who like them had no respect for my lordship. In my fury
I did not .send the whole body of my troops. ... I led merely the body-guard, who
follows me wherever I go, to Ashdod. But Yamani fled as I approac-hed to the
border of Egypt, which lies beside Meluhha, and was seen no more. I besieged
and plundered Ashdod, Gath, and Ashdodiramu ['* The port of Ashdod," D'H "IIICN,
or, " Gath of the Ashdodites," according to some interpreters], and carried off as
booty their goods, women, sons and daughters, property, the palace treasures, and
the people of the land. I re-peopled those towns anew . . . and put my lieutenants
over them and counted them to the people of Assyria.'— /r*//. BUil. ii, pp. C(i, G7.

KA'n. p. 71.

THE HISTOUV OF THE PHILISTINES 65

Sennacheril) then cut off some of the tcriitorv of .Iiidali aiid divided
it anion<ij his vassals, Mitinti, kiii<^ of Aslidod. Padi the restored
king of Ekron, and Zilbel, king of Gaza.^

Sennacherib was assassinated in C81,and his son lOsarhaddon (fJSl
G68) reigned in his stead. In the Hsts of kings in snbjectioii to this
monarch we find INIitinti, king of Aslikeh)n (the Assyrian records
seem to confuse Ashkelon and Aslidod), and Zilbel, king of Ga/a, of
whom we have heard before. Padi has disappeared IVoni Ekron, and
to him has succeeded a king with the old Philistine name of Ikansu
(=Achish). On the other hand a king with the Semitic name of
Ahimilki (Ahinielech) is king of xVshdod. All these kings survi\ed
into the reign of Assurbanipal, who began to reign in 6GH.'~

According to Jeremiah xlvii. 1 (not the Greek Version) ' Pharaoh
smote Gaza' in the time of that j)rophet. This most likely was
Xecho, on his way northward when Josiah, with fatal consequences to
himself, tried to check him. Herodotus is supposed to refer to this
when he says (ii. 159) that Necho took a great city of Syria called
^Kadytis\ which elsewhere (iii. 5) lie describes as a city in his
opinion not smaller than Sardis. It is a possible, but not a convincing,

' ' Mcnahcni of the town of San\aria, Etliba'al of Sidoii, Milinti of Aslulod [and
a number of others] all the kings of the "West brought rieh presents . . . and kissed
my feet. And Zidka, the king of Ashkelon, who had not submitted to my yoke, the
gods of his house, himself, his wife, his sons, liis daughters, his brothers, the seed
j)f his liouse, I dragged off and brought them to Assyria. Sarludari, the son of
Itukipti, their former king, I set again as king over the people of Ashkelon, took
tribute and submission from him, and he beeame obedient to me. In the course of
my expedition, I besieged Beth-Dagon, Joppa, Bene-Barka, Azuri, the towns of
Zidka, which had not promptly submitted to me : I jilundered them and dragged
booty away from them. The princ-ipal men of Amkarruna (Ekron) who had cast
Padi, who by the right and oath of Assyria was the king, into fetters and delivered
iiim up to Hezekiah of Judah, who had shut him in prison — their heart feared.
'Ihe kings of the land of Egypt sent archers, chariots, and horses of the king of
Meluhha, a countless array, and came to help them. Their army stood against me
before the town El-Tekeh, they raised their weapons. Trusting in Asshur, my
Lord, I fought with them and subdued them ; I took the chiefs of the chariots and
the son of one of the kings of Egypt, and the chief of the chariots of the king of
Meluhha prisoners with my own hand in the in'li'e : I besieged El-Tekeh and
'J'imnath, and plundered them and took away their booty. Then I turned before
Ekron, the chief men who had done evil I slew and hung their bodies on poles
round the city : the inhabitants who had done evil I led out as prisoners : with the
rest, who had done no evil, I made peace. Padi their king I led from Jerusalem
and put him again on the throne of his lordship. I laid the tribute of my lordship
upon him. Of Hezekiah ... I besieged forty-six fortified towns . . . his towns which
I had i)lundered, I took from his land and gave them to Mitinti, king of Ashdod,
Padi, king of Ekron, and Zilbel, king of Gaza, and I cut his land short. To the
former tribute I added the tribute due to my lordship and laid it upon them.' —
yr. Ji. ii, pY>. i)0-9j.

'' K. B. ii, pp. 1-18, U9, and 238-211.

66 THE SCIiWEICH LECTURES, 1911

hypothesis, that Kadvtis may represent some form of tlie name of
Gaza.i

Here the Assyrian records leave us. A\^e have, however, one more
Biblical reference, in the last paragraph of the book of Nehemiah, which
is of very great importance (xiii. Sfi, 24). The walls of Jerusalem had
been restored ; the law published and proclaimed ; all the steps had
been taken to establish an exclusive theocratic state in accordance with
the priestly legislation ; when the leader was dismayed to discover
certain Jews who had married women of Ashdod, of Ammon, and of
Moab, the very connnunities that had put so many obstacles in the
way of the work of restoration.^ Not only so, but there were already
children ; and as is usual in such cases of mixed marriage, these
children spoke the language of their mothers only. Nehemiah
indulged in a passionate display of temper, treating the culprits with
personal violence, and probably he compelled them to put away their
wives, as Ezra did in a similar case. But the interest for us is not in
Xehemiah's outburst, but in his reference to the speech of the children.
They spoke half in the speech of Ashdod, and could not speak in the
Jews'* language. In spite of Sennacherib's transportations and
deportations ; in spite of the long and exhausting siege of twenty-
nine years which the city (according to Herodotus ii. 157) sustained
in the following century at the hands of Psammctichus ; ye!; the
ancient tongue of the Philistines lingered still in Ashdod, the town
which probably retained exotic characteristics the longest. The
distinction which Strabo (XVI. ii. 1) draws between the TaCcnoL and
the 'ACcorioi ('Jews, Idumaeans, Gazaeans, and Azotii' being the four
minor races of Syria which he enumerates) may possibly be founded
on a reminiscence of these linguistic survivals. No doubt the language
was by now much contaminated with Semitic words and idioms, but
still it possessed suflicient individuality to be unintelligible without
special study. It had of course lost all political importance, so that
it was not as in the days of Samson and Jonathan, when every
Hebrew of position was obliged to know something of the tongue of
the powerful rivals of his people : it was now a despised patois, nuich
as are the ancient Celtic languages in the eyes of the average Saxon.
In the chatter of these little half-breeds the stern Jewish puritan was
perhaps privileged to hear the last accents of the speech of Minos,
whose written records still 'mock us, undeciphcrcd'.

1 See ^Meyer's History of the City of Gaza, p. 38. Noordtzij, De Filistijnen,
p. 171, identifies it with Kadesh, which is reasonable.

'' Nell. iv. 7. See also Ps. Ixxxiii, which, accord inj^ to the most likely view, was
composed during the anxieties altcndin;^ the restoration of Jerusalem.

THE HISTORY OF THE IMHLISTINES 67

It is true that some critics have explained tlie ' speecli of Ashdod'
as being the tongue of Sennacheril/s colonists. If so, however,.
Nehcmiah (himself a returned exile from a neighhouriiii;- em|)ire to
Sennacherib's) would })rol)ably have had some undei^tanding of it and
of its origin, and would have described it differently. The Semitic
speech of the children of the Annnonite and Moabite mothers does
not seem to have caused him so much vexation.

In Gaza, too, Philistine tradition still survived. Down to the
time of the Maccabean revolt there remained here a temple of
Dagon, destroyed by Jonathan Maccabaeus (1 Mace. x. 8'3, 8-i ; xi. 4).
But these traditional survivals of religious peculiarities are mere
isolated phenomena : apart from them the absorption of Philistia iu
the ocean of Semitic humanity is so complete that its people ceases to
have an independent history. It were profitless to trace the story of
Philistia further, through the campaigns of Alexander, the wars of
the Maccabees and the Seleucids, the Roman domination, and the
complex later developments : the record is no longer the history of
a people ; it is that of a country.

Nevertheless, the tradition of the Philistines still lives, and will
continue to live so long as the land which they dominated three
thousand years ago continues to be called ' Palestine ', and so long as
its peasant parents continue to tell their children their tales of the
Fen'ish. One accustomed to the current English pronunciation of
the name of the Phoenicians might for a moment be misled into
snpposing that these were the })eo})le meant : but the ecjuation is
philoh)gically impossible. There can be no doubt that this people of
tradition, supposed to have wrought strange and wonderful deeds in
the land, to have hewn out its great artificial caves and built its
castles and even the churches and monasteries whose fast-decaying
ruins dots its landscape — that this people is none other than the
mighty nation of the Philistines.

CHAPTEK III

TIIK LAND OF THE PHILISTINES

The c'ountrv of the Philistines is definitely limited, in Joshua xiii. 2,
between the Shlhor or ' River of E,L?yjit \ the present Wady el-Arish,
on the Etcvptian frontier, wliich joins the sea at Rhinocolura — and
*■ the borders of Ekron northward, which is counted to the Canaanites \
AVestward it was bounded by tlie Mediterranean Sea : eastward by the
foothills ofthe Judean mountains. From Deuteronomy ii. 23 we learn
that this territory had previously ])een in the possession of a tribe
called *Avv{m, of whom we know nothing but the name: from the
passage in Joshua just quoted it would appear that a remnant of
these aborigines still remained crowded down to the south. They
may possibly have l^een ofthe same stock as the neolithic pre-Semitic
people whose remains were found at Gezer. No doubt, as in the
majoritv of cases of the kind, they survived as a suljstratum of the
population in the rest of their ancient territory as well, engaged in
the hard manual labour to which the wilv (Tibeonites were con-
<lennu'd.

We also learn from Joshua (xi. 21) that there was a Rephaite or
'Anakim"' i-emnant left in some of the chief cities of the Philistine
territory, which must have l)een of considerable importance, to judge
from the stories of giant champions analvsed on a previous page.
How far the alliance of these formidable al)origines (which probablv
represent a pre-Canaanite immigration, later than the insignificant
'J Trim) enabled the southern Philistines to liold their ground so
nnidi longer than the northern Zakkala is an interesting question
the answer to which, however, could be noihing more than
speculative.

'J'hough no ancient aulhoritv ddinilclv states it, there can hardly
be any doubt that tlie repulse of the great attack on Egypt, in tlie
days of Ramessu III, was the event which led to the jK'rmancnt
settlement of the Cretan tribes on the coast land. It is possible,
indeed, fhat ihey already occupiid the rountrv as a militarv base for
their ojierations against Egypt: the dcs(ri[)tion, in the MedinetIIal)U
temj)le, of the advance of the invaders through the lands of the

Tin: LAND OF Tin: Philistines 6^

Hittites and North Syrians makes this at least noL iiii[)robable.
However the exact details of chronology work out, we cannot dis-
sociate the invasion of Egypt from the contemporaneous settlement
by foreigners on the sea-coast.

Israel was already, as we learn iVom tiie stela of Merneptah,^
established in the promised land ; and the Hebrew tribes had
already been reinforced by the contingent of Egyptian serfs (possiblv
the enslaved descendants of the Bedawin invaders known to history
as the Hyksos) and Kenites, whose traditions became the received
version of Hebrew onglnes. The tribe of Dan, situated on the sea-
coast, was driven inland, and forced to establish itself elsewhere :
but as we have seen, the whole length of the shore was occupied by
the intruders, even north of Joppa. Wen-Amon has chronicled for us
the settlement of Zakkala at Dor : that Sisera belonged to this tribe is
also highly probable : and the remarkable developments displayed by
the Phoenicians which distinguished them from all other Semites-
developments to be noted in the following chapter— make it no
longer possible to doubt that a very large Philistine or Zakkala
element entered into the composition of that people.

In the earlier part of the histoi-y, as we have already indicated, the
empire of the Philistines was Avidely spread over the country. As is
well known, the name Palestine is merely a corruption of PhUistia ;
and when Zephaniah or one of his editors calls Canaan ' the land of
the Philistines' (ii. 4) he is expressing little more than what was at
one time a fact. Their domination over the Hebrews is insisted on
in both Judges and Samuel : the early kings of the Hebrews are
elected with the specific purpose of freeing the people from the
foreign yoke : a governor is established in a town close to Jerusalem :
even at Beth-Shan, at the inner end of the plain Esdraelon, which
once swarmed with the chariots of Sisera, the Philistines were
able to fix Saul's body as a trophy : and the coui-se of the history
shows that they were there established in sufficient strength and with
sufficient permanence to make the recovery of the trophy ditiicult.

The name of Beth-Dagon, the house of their chief god, is found
among the towns enumerated to the northern coast-dwellers of the
tribe of Asher (Joshua xix. 27) ; and there was a similarly named and
better known town in the land of the southern Philistines ; but these
names, as we shall see in the following chapter, are older than the
Philistine settlement. ' The stronghold above Jericho called Dagon
(mentioned in Josephus, Ant. xiii. 8. 1, Wars, i. ii. 3) is no doubt
the same as Dok (now 'Ain ed-Duk) where Simon was murdered
(1 Mace. xvi. 15) : probably the form of the name in Josephus is

70 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

an error. There is a modern Beit Dejan near Nablus, which marks
a third place of the same name, not recorded in history.

The Northern tribe of the foreigners must have become early
absorbed by their Semitic neighbours. The Southern people, however,
seated on their rich coast-plain and established in their powerful
metropolitan cities, were longer able to maintain their ethnic inde-
pendence. The wars of David drove them back on the coast, and
reduced them to a subordinate position ; and, as the names of the
kings recorded in the Assyrian records show, they rapidly became
^emitized as time went on. As we have seen in the last chapter,
however, their national traditions fought a long fight against absorp-
tion and oblivion. The pride of the Philistines — their persistent
refusal to submit to Hebrew prejudices, such as the tabu against
eatinff flesh with the ])lood and forbidden meats — was as offensive
to Deutero-Zechariah (ix. 7) as is the pride of the Irish or Welsh
nationalist to the average Englishman. Though in the later history
we hear so little about them, they nnist still have been troublesome
neighbours ; otherwise there would not be such a constant chain of
prophetic denunciations. Amos first, then Isaiah, Zephaniah, Joel,
and the later prophets Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Zechariah all pronounce
woes upon them. One of EzekieFs strongest denunciations of the
corruptions of his own people well expresses the national hatred —
even the daughters of the Philistines are ashamed at contemplating
them (Ezek. xvi. 27). The son of Sirach says that ' his heart
abhorreth them that sit upon the mountains of Samaria, and them
that dwelt among the Philistines'' (Ecclus. 1. 26). Except for the
naturalized Philistines in David's entourage, there is but one lull in
the storm of war between the two nations throughout the Old Testa-
ment. This is in the charming poem, Psalm Ixxxvii, written apj)arently
imder some one of the later kings. The psalmist pictures Yahweh
enthroned upon His best-loved seat, the holy n)ountains of Zion, and
reading, as it were, a census-roll of His peoj)le. This one was born in
Egypt or Babylon — that one in Philistia or Tyre — yet all own Zion
as their common Mother. The })salm is a miniature edition of the
Book of Jonah : the poefs large-hearted univei'salism looks forward
to an abolition of national jealousies.

Their cities all existed from pre-Philistine days. They are all,
except the Beth-Dagons, mentioned in the Tell el-Amania cor-
respondence, and were then already connnunities of importance : how
much faither ])a(k their history may go it is impossible to tell. Like
the Hebrews, who aj)pear to have added only one city — Samaria — to
those which thev inherited in the Promised Land, the Philistines

TIIK LAND OF 'J1I]<: rillLISTINES 71

were not city builders. Indeed we liardlv would expect this of tlie
'reoj)les of the Sea\ Ziklaf^, soniewJierc in the soutli of" tlie ^hili^tine
territory, but not }'et identified satisfactorily, may have been a new
foundation: this, however, rests merely upon the vague circumstance
that it has been impossible to find a satisfactory Semitic etymology
for the name, which conceivabl}' echoes the name of the Zakkula. If
so, we understand better how the southern sept of the Philistines comes
to be specifically called ' Cherethites ' or 'Cretans'. On the other
hand, we elsewhere find the Zakkala in the north.

The five metropolitan cities of the Philistines were Ga/a, Ashkelon,
Gath, Ashdod, and Ekron. The first-mentioned is the only one of
the five that still retains anything of its former importance. It is
a modern, well-Avatered, and populous town, standing on the ancient
site, and in the form Gh7izr:eh letaining the ancient name. It is
])rominent in the Samson epic. We have already noticed the revolt
of its leader, Ilanunu, against the king of Assyria — a revolt that led
to the battle of Raphia (710 n. c), the first struggle between Egypt
and Assyria. From Amos i. 0 we learn that Gaza was the centre of
a. slave-trade, which added bitterness to the relations between the
Philistines and their Israelite neighbours. In 3;32 n.c. the city was
besieged for two months })y Alexander the Great. Its later history
but slightly concerns us, though we mav mention its total destruction
by Alexander Jannaeus. It recovered even from this catastrophe, and
Ave find it in the second and third centuries a.d. as the centre of
worship of a deity ])eculiar to itself, called Mama, the ritual of
whose service recalls in some respects that of the rites of Dagon.
T^his cult, indeed, was probably the last relic of the Philistines, apart
from the vague modern traditions to which we have already referred.

The city was surrounded by a wall, and watch-towers were erected
at a distance from it, to give warning as early as possible of the
approach of an enemy (2 Kings xviii. 8).^ A neighbouring harbour
town, called Matou/xd ra^'vjs', was of considerable im})ortance and for
a time was the site of a bishopric.

Ashkelon was the only city of the five that stood on the sea-
coast, though other maritime cities, such as .Io])pa, wei'e (at least
from time to time) also in Philistine hands. Its harbour, though
inadequate for modern use, was sufficient for the small ships of
antiquity. Samson visited Ashkelon to seize the wager he was
obliged to pay after his riddle had been solved.'- It is, however, from

' So a sentry-station was cstablislKcl on a liill sonic way S. of Gczer : sec my
Excavation of Gezer, vol. ii, p. '^G!).

" It lias been suggested that this took \A;\vv not at Aslikelon. bul at a small site

72 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

much later times — INIaccabean, early Arab, and Crusader — that the
chief historical importance of the city dates. These lie outside our
present scope. We need not do more than mention the etymological
speculations of Stephanus of Byzantium, who tells us that this city
was founded by Askalos, brother of Tantalos and son of Hymenaios ;
and the statement of Benjamin of Tudela that Ezra re-founded
Ashkelon under the name Benebrah.^

Gath, reasonably identified with the enormous mound known as
Tell es-Safi at the embouchure of the V^alley of Elah, had a different
history from the rest. It seems in the time of the greatest extension
of the Philistine power to have been the principal city of the five : at
least the application to its ruler Achish of the title melrJc, ' king- '
(rather than the technical term ^eren, applied normally to the ' lords '
of the riiilistines), if not a mere inadvertence, suggests that at least
he v>'as j)rb/nis 'niter pares. He has, however, to bow to the wishes of
his colleaiiues in the matter of David's alliance with him. In l)avid\>
lament over Saul and Jonathan, Gath and Ashkelon are the two
pronn"nent cities specially mentioned ; and (probably through the
influence of that popular lay) ' tell it not in Gath ' became a current
catchword, which we meet once again in ]Micah i. 10. It is not
infrequently used as such among ourselves ; but in Hebrew it has
a further aid to popularity in an alliteration, as though one should
say ' gad not in Gath '.

But as we have already noticed, the name drops out from all
references to the Philistines in the later literature : the Pentapolis
becomes a Tetrapolis, and the hegemony passes over to Ashdod,
which in time becomes the last typical Philistine city. This cannot
be explained, however, by a total destruction of the city of Gath.
For the excavations carried on by the Palestine Exploration Fund in
1900 at Tell es-Safi showed that the site had been continuously
occupied from very early times to the days of a modern village,
whose houses and extensive graveyards seal up the secrets of the
greater part of this im])ortant mound IVom the curiosity of the
explorer. The tiue explanation is, that from the time of its contjuest
by Uzziah, (iath was reckoned a city of Judah by the Hebrew
prophets. In the gradual shrinking oi' the JMiilistine border it
would be one of the first to fall into Hebrew hands.

A destruction of Gath — probably the sacking by Uzziah — was still

in the valley of Elah called Khnrbel (= ruin 'Askalan. This is cerlainly nearer
to Timnath, but there are here no traccjibk- remains older than the Roman period.
' A description of the remains at Ashkelon, with a plan, will be found in tiie
Qnnrttrly Stnfimenl of the Palestine Exploration Fund for January I!»i:{.

THE I.AM) OF THE PIIIEISTINES 7'5

fresh ill iiieinory when .Vinos prophesied, and was used by him as an
ilhistration to enforce his deiiuneiation of Samaria (\ i. 2) ; in his (irst
chapter we ah-eady find Gath omitted from the hst of IMiiHstine cities;
and the reference immediately afterwards to ' the remnant of the
Phihstines''(i. 8) suggests that that people had shortly before siifferetl
loss. In iii. 9 the words ' publisii in the palaces at Ashdod '
may possibly be an adaptation of the proverbial catchword already
mentioned, modified to suit the altered circumstances. It lii<ewise
is assonantal in Hebrew.

Sargon, it is true, shortly after Uzzialfs time, calls the city ' Gath
of the Ashdodites ' (if this be the correct translation of the phrase) ;
but no doubt it was a matter of indifference in the eyes of the great
king which of two trumpery communities claimed the possession
of a town, so long as he himself had a satisfying share of the
plunder.

It is unfortunate that the city had such a conniionplace name. Its
meaning, ' winepress,"" was applicable to many sites, and it was
evidently used for more places than one. This makes the reconstruc-
tion of the history of Gath rather difficult. Thus, the Gath fortified
by liehoboam (2 Chron. xi. 8) can hardly be the Philistine city of that
name ; and certain other places such as Gath-hepher, Gath-rimmon,
and Moresheth-gath, must be carefully distinguished therefrom. The
same word appears in the Gethsemane of the New Testament.

Ashdod, the city to which the ark was first taken, is now repre-
sented by an insignificant village, whose only object of interest is
the ruin of a large Saracenic khan : but ruins of more important
buildings seem to have been seen here by seventeenth-century
travellers.^ Yet it must have been a city of special importance in
the Pentapolis. Like Gaza, it had its ' palaces ' (Amos iii. 9). As
we have seen, Ashdod longest preserved the Philistine national
tradition. ' The speech of Ashdod ' lasted down to the time of
Nehemiah. The temple of Dagon stood there till tlestroyed l)v
the Maccabees (1 Mace. x. 83, 84). But the ' altars and gods ■" of
the city, destroyed by Judas a few years before (1 Mace. v. 08), were
perhaps objects rather of Iliilcnic cult, Avhich at this date was well
established in Western Palestine.

The great siege of Ashdod by Psamineticus, already referred to, is
unknown to us except from Herodotus. It seems almost incrediblv
protracted, and probably there is something wrong with Herodotus"
figures. Jeremiah's references to the rcmiuitd of Ashdod (xw. 520)
and Zephaniah^s emphasis on a siege which shall drive out Ashdod at

* See Sepp, Jerusalem und (/<t-i hfilnje Lnmi, vol. ii, p. .iUH.

74 THE SCIIWEICIT LECTURES, 1911

the nooiitlay (ii. -i)— i. e. wliicli shall last half a day only — are
plausibly supjjosed to imply allusion to this event. A small inlet
in the neighb()unn<jf coastline served Ashdod for a harbour : it is
now called Mlnct el-KaVah^ 'the harbour of the fortress ' : a tradition
of some fortification of the harbour is thus preserved, as well as
the Greek name Kijxm], which has been transformed into the Arabic
El-M'nieh ; the initial A ha\ iiii^- been mistaken for the Arabic
article.

Ekron, since the time of l{obinson, has alwavs been ecpiated to the
village of 'Akir, now the site of a flourishing Jewish colony, whose
red roofs are conspicuous on the seaward side of the Jerusalem
railway soon after leaving Hamleh. But there are no remains of
any ancient occuj^ation here commensurate with the importance of
the place. There are a few local traditions in 'Akir, but they are
quite vague. Bauer {Mitthe'iluugen d. dentscli. Pal. Vereins^ 1899,
p. 43) describes a visit he paid to the old moscjue, the one stone
building in the fellah village, erected on its highe.-t point. There
is a forecourt and portico with two rows of pillars. The thresholds
are of marble. An old sheikh told him that the mosque was as old
as the time of Abraham ; but many such tales ai-e told in Palestine
of comparatively modern buildings. Ekron, if the place of the
ancient oracle of Baal-zebub were really at 'Akir, has vanished
utterly, leaving scarcely a potsherd behind. This is not what usually
happens to ancient Palestine cities. AVith some hesitation I venture
on tlie followiufj sui^irestions.

o or?

To me there seems to be a confusion between two places of the
same name. In Joshua xiii. 1-3, where the land not possessed
by Joshua is detailed, we find mention made of the region of the
Philistines and of the little southern tribe of the Geshurites, to ' the
border of Ekron-Saphonah, ■n'ltiih is counted to the Canaanites''^ and
also the five lords of the PhiUsthie.s, among which by contrast are
enumerated the Ekronites. This expression ' Ekron-Saphonah ' is
correctly translated ' Ekron northward ' in the English Bible ; but
it can also mean 'Northern Ekron \ which to me seems here to give
a more int(']ligi])le sense.

Again, in Joshua xv. 11 we iiiul ilie border of Ihc lenitorv of Judah
as running 'unto the side of Ekron-Saj)hona]i ' ; an ex})ression which
I take to mean that this city, though adjoining the territory of
Judaii, was actually bevond its border. If so, it would be in the
tribe of Dan ; and in Joshua xix. 43 we actually find an Ekron
enumerated among the Danite towns. Here, as there is no ambiguity,
the qualifying adjective ' Northern ' is omitted. The Southern Ekron

THE LAND OF THK PIIILISTINES 75

would then l)el()ii^' to the trilx' of" Jiidali, in the thcoivtical scheme
•elaborated in the book ot" Joshua ; and \vc (ind it diilv imiitioned.
between Mareshah and Aslidod.

Again, the story of the rout after the l)attle of Kphes-Danniiiin
(1 Sam. xvii. 52-54) is suggestive. The pursuit went 'by the w.-iy
to the two gates, to Gath and to Ekron \ 'Akir, the usual site given
for Ekron, eannot be spoken of a gate^ in the sense that Gath, com-
manding as it does the mouth of the valley of Elah, can be so termed ;
and a chase of the Philistines jirolonged through Philistine tcrntorij
for sueh a long distance as from Gath to 'Akir is not very prol)al)le.
We seem io find the other gate at a subsidiary outlet of the \'alley of
Elah, to the south of Gath, where stands a village called Dhikerln.
And Dhikerln lies exactly in a straight line between Ik'it Jibrln and
'Esdud, the modern representatives of Mareshah and Ashdod.

Written in English letters, ' Dhikerln ' is not unlike ' Kkron ' in
general appearance. But philologically there can be no direct con-
nexion between them, and my arguments in fa\ our of the identification
here suggested rest on grounds different from the superficial similai'ity
of name. The single letter A,' in English represents two entirely different
sounds in Hebrew and Arabic; one of these (d) appears in 'DMkerin,
the other (p) in Ekron, as in 'AJdr. These letters can be treated as
interchangeable in one case only. As in English, so in Greek, one sound
and one character represent these two letters : and if for a \\hile
a district had become thoroughly Hellenized, the Greek k might have
been (so to speak) as a ' bridge' for the passing of one sound into the
other. When the Semitic speech reasserted itself, it might have
taken up the name with the wrong /r. There is thus a possibility
that a different word has become sulistituted for a half-forgotten and
wholly misunderstood Hebrew name. But no stress can be laid upon
this possible accident.

Dhikerin presents obvious signs of anticpiity. Great artificial caves
and huge cisterns are cut in the rock, testifying to its former impor-
tance, and it has never been finally identified with any other ancient
site, though some of the earlier explorers have thought to find here no
less a place than Gath itself. The Tahnuds have iiotliing to say
about it save that the name is derived from N~I3T 'male', because
the women there all beai- male children.^ Clcrmont-Ganneau {livcueil
/Tarch. orient, iv. 25-i) suggests a connexion between this place-name
and that of the Zakkala.

Let us now look back for a moment to the story of the wanderings
of the Ark. Suppose that the Gittitcs, when the plague broke out
' Neubauer, Geog. d. Talm. j). 71.

76 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

anioii" tliiin. sent the .\rk, not to 'Akir, hut to Dliikerin — which was
much nearer and more convenient — we have tlien an immediate
answer to an ohvious ditticulty. AVhy did the I'hihstines expect
the ark to go anywhere near Beth-Shemesh at all r We must
remember that thev were not merely trying' to get rid of the ark:
they were on the look-out for a sign that the pestilence was a mani-
festation of the wrath of the God of the Hebrews. They must
therefore have expected the Ark to return whence it had come, to
the sanctuary at Shiloh, of whose existence and importance they could
not have been ignorant. This was the natural goal of the sacred
symbol, north of the great Canaanite wedge that centred in Jerusalem
and separated the northern Israelites from their brethren in the
south. From Shiloh the Ark had been taken : Shiloh was the chief
centre of Hebrew religious life at the time : and to Shiloh the Ark
should be expected to find its way back.^ Therefore, if it was at
the time in 'Akir, it ought to have gone by the northern \alley route,
into the Valley of Aijalon, so striking into the road for Shiloh some
ten miles north of Jerusalem. If from 'Akir it went southward it
would be shunted oft' south of the Canaanites into the southei'u
territory, where no specially important shrine of the period is recorded.
From 'Akir, therefore, it should not go within miles of Beth-Shemesh.
But from Dliikerin, the only way toward Shiloh, avoiding Jerusalem,
is by a valley route that leads straight to Beth-Sheinesh and perforce
passes that town.

Further evidence is given us by the ^torv of the march of Sen-
nacherib. That monarch was engaged in reducing })laces easily
identified as the modern Jaffa, Yazur, Ibn Berak, and Beit Dejan,
when the Ekronites leagued themselves with the North Arabians
and the Egyptians. Sennacherib met the allies at El-Tekeh, a place
unfortunately not identified : it presumably was near the Northern
Ekron, as the two j)laces are mentioned together as border towns in
Dan, Joshua xix. 40. This Northern Ekron, we may agree, might
well be represented by 'Akir, whose poverty in anticpiities accords
with tlie apparent insignificance of the Daniti,- town. Close to 'Akir
is a village in the plain, called ZenmkaJi, a name which may possibly
echo the name of El-Tekeh. In any case Sennacherib was victoriou.v
and then went straiglit to Tiiiinath, which he reduced, after which
he proceeded to attack Ekron. This order of proceedings is iucon-

' Meyer, (Jesch. d. Alterlhams, i, j). :}J8, suggests from Jer. vii. It, tliat Sliiloli
was destroyed. But the space of time between Samuel and Jeremiah is so long,
that many unrecorded events miglit have taken place in the meanwhile : and,
indeed, Shiloli is still an imj^ortant sanctuary in 1 Sam. xiv. 3.

THE LAND OF THE IMHLISTINES 77

sistent witli 'Akir as tlio site of I'.kron. Scniiaclicriirs successful
progress against the south we should exj)ect to proceed steadily
southward, involving an attack on 'Akir before the reduction of
Timnath. Ekron must therefore have been south from 'I'ibjicli.
whicli fits the conditions of the site now suggested.

Ski'tfli-mai) of IMiili^ti.i.

The denunciations of Ekron in flie jirophetic books help us very
little in the solution of the prol)lem. liut there is a suggestive hint
in the opening verses of :2 Kings. Ahaziah having met with an
accident sent to iiuiuire of Baal-zebub 'lord of flies', the go 1 of
Ekron, as to his ])rospects of recovery. When we find that less
than a couple of miles from Dhikerin there is a village bearing the
name o? Dcir edh-Dhuhhaii. ' tlie convent of the flics", we feel some

78 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

juslilication in asking, can it be that Baal-zebuh still rules his
ancient lordship ?

The land of the Philistines, dominated by these five cities, lias
been so often described that it is needless to waste space in an account
of it. BrieHy, we may say that whoever held that part of the country
was at an enormous advantage, ^^'^ith the possible exception of the
plain of Esdraelon, it is the most fertile land in Western Palestine.
Though there are few perennial streams, water can be found wherever
one chooses to dig for it. Through it runs the great trade-route
from Egypt by Damascus to Babylon. The mart of Gaza is the
natural rendezvous of all who have commerce with Arabia. The
seaports of Southern Palestine are all commanded, as are the valleys
which are the doorways to the Hinterland : so that the coast dwellers
can engage in commerce on their own account, while at the same time
they can control the progress and civilization among the aliens in the
interior. When we stand on some eminence that commands this rich
strip of territory we find it easy to understand the bitterness with
which throutih the centuries the Hebrews regarded the Philistines.

CHAPTER IN

THE CULTURE OE THE IMHLIS TINES

I. Their LaX(;ia{;k.

Of the languaj^e of the PhilistiiiL's \vc arc profoiiiHlly i<;iioraMt.
An inscription in their tongue, written in an intelligible script, would
be one of the greatest rewards that an explorer of Palestine could
look for. As vet, the only materials we have for a study of the
Philistine language are a few proper names, and possibly some words,
apparently non-Semitic, embedded here and there in the Hebrew of
the Old Testament. Thus, our scanty information is entirely drawn
from foreign sources. We are exactly in the same position as a
student of some obscure Oriental language would be, if his only
materials were the names of natives as reported in English news-
papers. Now, we are all familiar with the barbarous and meaningless
abbreviation ' Abdul ', applied with various dei)reciatory epithets to
a certain ex-potentate. Some time ago a friend called my attention
to a paragraph in, I think, a Manchester pa{)er, describing how
a certain Arab ' named Sam Seddon' had been prosecuted lor some
offence: though the 'Arabian Nights' is almost an English classic,
the reporter had failed to recognize the connnon name SJiciiis cd-Din\
If we were obliged to reconstruct the Arabic language from materials
of this kind, we could hardly expect to get very far ; but in at-
tempting to I'ccover something of the Philistine language wc are no
better off".

The one common noun which we know with tolerabk- certainty is
.v;-^7i, the regular word in the Hebrew text for the 'lords' by which
the Philistines were governed : a word very reasonably compared with
the Greek Tvpavio's.^ This, however, does not lead us very far. It
happens that no satisfactory Indo-European etymology has been
found for rupai-i-oy, so that it may be a word altogether foreign to
the Indo-European family. In any case, one word could hardly
decide the relationship of the Philistine language any more than

1 The ' Lords of the Philistines ' are, however, in tlie Greek Vtrsioii called
aarpcLTtai; but in Judges (except iii. IJ), Codex Vatieanus and allied MSS. have
apyovTis, a rendering also found soinelinies in Josepluis.

80 THE SCHWEK'H LECTURES, 1911

could 'benvaP (sici) decide the relationship of Pictish in the hands
of Sir Walter Scott's amateur philolonjists.

The word sereii is once used (1 Kings vii. ;}()) as a technical term
for some lironze objects, part of the 'bases' made for the temple
(wheel-axles ?). Tliis is probably a different word with different
etymological connexions. The word m'^konah in the list cited
below, is found in tlie same verse.

Renan, in his so-called H'tsto'vc du penple (TIsrn'cl, has collected
a list of words which he suggests may have been imported into
Hebrew from Philistine sources. That there should be such borrowing
is a priori not improbable : we have already shown that the leaders
among Hebrew speakers must have understood the Philistine tongue
down to the time of David at least. But Renan's list is far from
convincing. It is as follows :

parbar or par var, ' a suburb' : compare /;^r/7;oZ».?.
m'^konah, something with movable wheels: compare uiachina.
m ^ k he rah, ' a sword ' : compare fxdx^aipa.
caphtor, 'a crown, chaplet': compare capital.
pllegesh, 'a concubine': compare ^;^//^j'.

A further comparison of the name of Araunah the Jebusite, on
A\hose threshing-floor the plague was stayed (and therefore ' the
place in Jerusalem from which pestilential vapours arose' !), with
the neuter plural form Averna, need hardly he taken seriously.

But since Renan wrote, the discovery of the inscription on the
Black Stone of the Forum has shown us what Latin was like, as near
as we can get to the date of the Philistines, and gives us a warning
against attempts to interpret su])posed Philistine words by comparison
with Classical Latin. And, even if the above comparisons be sound,
the borrowing, as Noordtzij ^ justly remarks, might as well have taken
place the other way ; as is known to have haj)})ened in several cases
whicli he (|notes.

There is a word ynin or ynip meaning a 'helmet', the etymology of
which is uncertain." It may possibly be a IMiilistine word : the
random use of 2 and p suggests that they are attemj)ts to represent
a foreign initial guttural (cf. ante, \). 75). Both forms are used in
1 Sanniel xvii, the one ('n) to denote the helmet of tlie foreigner
Golialji, Die other ('p) that of the Ilchre-iC Saul. No stress can,
liowever, be laid on this distinction. The form 'p is used of the
lielmets of the foreigners named in l'',/ekic'l xxiii. 24, while '^ is
used of those of Uzziah's Ilehrdv army, 2 Cbronicles xxvi, 14.

' J)e Filhd/nfii, ].. SI. 2 Cf. Latin rai^pa, kc. (r).

THE CULTURE OF THE rillLISTINES 81

Of the ])lace-n;uiies mentioned in the Old 're.st:uiient there is not
one, with the possihle exee])tion of /ik].i<i;, which e.m be referred to
the rhihstine hinguage. All are either oljviously Semitic, or in any
case (being mentioned in the Tell el-Amarna letters) are older than
the Philistine .settlement. liit/ig has made ingenions attempts to
explain some of them by various Indo-European words, but these are
not successful.

The persons known to us are as follows :

(1) Abhuehrh, the king who had dealings with A])raham. A Semitic

name.

(2) AIjuz^Mth, Counsellor of No. (1): Semitic name.

(3) Phicol, General of No. (1). Not explained as Semitic : possibly

a current Philistine name adopted by the narrator.

(4) Badyra, king of Dor, in AVen-Amon's report. Probably not

Semitic.

(5) WaTati, a merchant, mentioned by Wen-Amon.

(6) Makaniani, a merchant, mentioned by Wen-Amon.

(7) Duffon, chief god of the Pliilistines.

(8) Delilah, probably not Philistine. See arite, p. 45.

(9) Si.s'era, king of Ilarosheth. See ante, p. 41, and com])are

Benesasira on the tablet of Keftian names.

(10) Achish or EkosJi,^ apparently the standard Philistine name, like

' John ' among ourselves. It seems to reappear in the old
Aegean home in the familiar form Ancliisea. It occurs twice
in the tablet of Keftian names {ante, p. 10) and in the
Assyrian tablets it appears in the form Ikau.'iur

(11) Maoch, father of Achish, king of Gath. Unexplained and

probably Philistine.

(12) Ittai, David's faithful Gittite friend, perhaps Philistine.

(13) Obed-Edom, a Gittite who sheltered the Ark : a pure Semitic

name.

(14) Goliath, a Rephaite, and therefore not Philistine.

(15) Saph, a Rephaite, and therefore not Philistine.

(16) Zaggl, a person signing as witness an Assyrian contract tablet

of the middle of the seventh century b. c. found at Gezer.
The name is not explained, and may be Philistine.

1 Max Miiller in his account of the school-tablet {ante, p. 10) compares the
Assyrian form Ikaiisu and the Greek 'Ayxovs, and infers that the true pronuncia-
tion of the name was soniethinfr like I'Jkd.ih.

2 But in the last edition of KAT. p. 4-37, it is noticed that this name can possibly
be read Ikasamsu or Ikasamsu.

82 THE SCH WEIGH LECTUllES, 1911

(17-26) The ten Philistine kings mentioned on the Assyrian tablets,
who without exception bear Semitic names. Sarhidari is an
Assyrian name, which may possil)ly have been adopted by its
bearer as a compliment to his master.

This list is so meagre that it is scarcely worth discussing. It will
be observed that at the outside not more than eight of these names
can be considered native Philistine.

Down to about the time of Solomon the Philistines preserved their
linguistic individuality. A basalt statuette of one Pet-auset was
found somewhere in the Delta,' in which he is descril)ed as an

mterpreter ax" CF^ tor Canaan and

PhUist'ia'. There would be no point in mentioning the two places
if they had a common language. Ashdod, we have seen, preserved
a patois down to the time of Nehemiah ; but it is clear that the
Philistines had become semitized by the time of the operations of the
Assvrian kings. It is likely that the Kephaite element in the
population was the leaven through which the Philistines became
finally assimilated in language and other customs to the surrounding
Semitic tribes, as soon as their supremacy had been destroyed by
David's wars. The Rephaites, of course, were primarily a pre-Semitic
people : but probablv they had themselves already become thoroughly
semitized by Amorite influence before the Philistines appeared on the
scene.

We have, besides, a number of documents which, when they have
been deciphered, may help us in reconstructing the ' speech of
Ashdod'. The close relationship of the Etruscans to tlie Philistines
suggests that the Etruscan inscriptions may some time be found to
have a bearing on the problem. It is also not inconceival)le that some
of the obscure languages of Asia Minor, specimens of which are pre-
served for us in the Hittite, Mitannian, Lycian, and Carian inscriptions
may have light to contribute. The inscriptions of Crete, in the
various Minoan scripts, and the Eteocretan inscriptions of Pracsos -
may also prove of importance in the investigation. Two other
alleged fragments of the ' Keftian ' language are at our service : the
list of names already quoted on p. 10, which suggestively contains
AkahoK and Bejieyisim : and a magical formula in a medical j\IS. of
the time of Thutmose III, published by Birch in 1871,'' which contains

^ See the description bj- Chassinjit, llullefin de Vinst. fraiir. (Varrh. au Caire, i.
(1901), p. J)8.

"^ See Conway in the Annual nf the British School at Athens, vol. viii, p. 12.5, for
an exhaustive analysis of tliese inscrij)tions.

■' Zeitschr. f. oyypt. Spraclie (1871), p. Gl.

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTINES 83

mter alia the following' — copied here from a corrected version pub-
lished by Ebers.^

snt nt '7 niw in dd-uf k f ti w

s 11 t w k p \v ■) y ^

nt r k

'Conjuration in the Atnu language which people call Keftiu —
senutiiiAapincaimant'ireJc'' or something similar. This is not more
intelligible than such formulae usually ai'e. Mr. Alton calls my atten-
tion to the tempting resemblance of the last letters to trke, turke,
0 r k e, a verb (?) common in the Etruscan inscriptions.

There is one document of conspicuous importance for our present
purpose, although it is as yet impossible to read it. This is the
famous disk of terra-cotta found in the excavation of the Cretan
palace of Phaestos, and dated to the period known as ^Middle Minoan
III — that is to say, about 1600 h.c. It is a roughly circular tablet of
terra cotta, 15-8-16-5 cm, in diameter. On each face is a spiral band
of four coils, indicated by a roughly drawn meandering line ; and an
inscription, in some form of picture-writing, has been impressed on
this band, one by one, from dies, probably resembling those used by
bookbinders. I suppose it is the oldest example of printing with
movable types in the world. On one face of the disk, which I call
Face I, there are 119 signs ; on the other face, here called Face II,
there are 123. They are divided into what appear to be word-groups,
30 in number on Face I and 31 on Face II, by lines cutting across the
spiral bands at right angles. These word-groups contain from two to
seven chai'acters each. There are forty-five different characters
employed. It is likely, therefore, from the largeness of this number
that we have to deal with a STjllaharij rather than an alphabet.

I have discussed this inscription in a paper contributed to the
Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy,- to which I must refer the
reader for the full investigation. Its special importance for our
present purpose is based upon the fact that the most frequently used
character, a man's head with a plumed head-dress, has from the

1 Zeitscin: der D. ^f. O. xxxi, pp. 4jl, 4.H.

2 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, vol. xxx, section C, p. 342.

G 2

THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

moment of its first discovery been recognized as identical in type with
the plumed head-dresses of the Philistine captives pictured at iNIedinet
Habu. This character appears only at the heginnings of words, from
which I infer that it is not a phonetic sign, but a determinative,
most probably denoting personal names. Assuming this, it next
appears that Face II consists of a list of personal names. Hepresent-

Fig. 4 A. The IMiaestos Disk (Face 1).

ing each character by a letter, which is to be regarded as a mere
algebraic svmbol and not a phonetic sign, we may write the inscription
on the disk in this form :

Face I (Fig. 4 a).
M^X.^^ S/3hw Mu^c xrjs logf pCa'i taxi /^htacr
XnFr\ hosw M(|vj srjya noogw pzir nla dwjxl IM-sa
nvhf nft n/3h xnvhf sm^?/ hrrw h/Sh \\C,<t8 xnvhf
TTOX'rh Mdw^h \\m(i] j-ih

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTINES

Face II (Fi<^. -1 n) : written as a list of names.
L M^tao- 8ff n^h nnm

2. Mfbsf s/3hf S(/)f

3. Mfd(r(<|)) kqw

4. M^rrw arsh

5. ^I^Cy XK MsrjA^o- pa M^kq

'^.

4
^

■t'

eA'

iP^\^

-^^sP;

%S?

f^i

1)^^

,^-

•1 , =%

Fig. 4 b. The Pliaestos Disk (Face II).

6. Mfssvru6' If Mfkq MsrjACcr pa Mfkq

7. Mfszjcrs d(T(/)r kqf

8. IMfta (>w Aey

9. ]M£sswu^ ta Aey

There is just one type of ancient document whicli shows such a
' sediment ', so to speak, of proper names at the end. This is a contract
tablet, which ends with a list of witnesses, and in the paper above

86 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

referred to I have put forward the conjecture that the disk is of this
nature. In Face I, although not one word of the inscription can be
deciphered, it will be found that, applying the clue of the proper
names, everything fits exactly in its })lace, assuming the ordinary
formula of a contract such as we fhid it in cuneiform documents.

The first two words would give us the name and title of the pre-
siding magistrate : then comes the name of one of the contracting
parties, u^c x^js : then come six words or word-groups, quite unin-
telligible, but not improbably stating what this person undertakes to
do : then follows w hat would be the name of the other contracting
party.

Next come some words which ou<;ht to ijive some such essential
detail as the date of the contract. And we find among these words
just what we want, a proper name 7:sa, denoting the officer who was
eponvmous of the year.

The last thirteen words we might expect to be a detailed inventory
of the transaction, whatever its nature may have been. It is there-
fore satisfactory to notice that they arrange themselves neatly, just
as they stand, in three parallel colunnis, having obvious mutual
relations: thus —

nvhf
X-nvhf

X-nvhf Troxo-h ]MdwCh

. . .

n-ft

n-/:ih

s-m(>;

h-sw

h-/3h

n-m(,'7/

,ih

h-Cah

which table not only confirms the conclusions arrived at, but illus-
trates a rule that may also be inferred from the list of witnesses on
Face II. Words are declined by prefixes ^, s, n, h, x and suffixes
w, ^ ; and 7Cords hi apposition have the same 'prefix. See the third
column of the above table, and the titles of witnesses 1, 2. We
have a word ^h in several forms : s-/3h-w, n-/ih, h-/3h, s-/3h-^.
Further, ^, prefixed to the ' name of the magistrate ' and all the
names of witnesses, probably means 'before, in the presence of.
The name which follows that of the two witnesses 5 and 6 is
probably that of their father, and this assumed it follows that
the prefix s probably has a genitive sense.

There remains one imjjortant point. At the l)ottom of certain
characters there is a sloping line running to the left. This is always
at the end of a word-group : the two apparent exceptions shown in
some drawings of the disk (in word-groups G and %h on Face II) being
seemingly cracks in the surface of the disk. The letters marked are
underlined in the transcript given above. I suggest with regard to

THE CULTURE OE THE PHHJSTINES 87

these marks that thev are meant to ixpress a modification of" the
phonetic vahie of" the character, too sh'^ht to re(juire a different letter
to express it, but too marked to allow it to he neglected altogether.
xVnd obviously the most likely modification of" the kind would be the
olision of the vowel of a final open syllable. 'J'lie mark would thus
be exactly like the v'naina of the Devanairiul alj)hal)et.^ ^Vhen we
examine the text, we find that it is only in certain words that this
mark occurs. It is found in /3h, however declined, except when the
suffixes w, £, are present. It is found in the word nvhf, however
declined, and appears in the two similar words juhta<7 and Mftao-. It
is found in the personal name kq (in the fonnula pa M^kq). There
are only one or two of the eighteen examples of its use outside these
grouj)s, and probably if we had some moie exanq)les of the script, or
a longer text, these would be found to fit likewise into series. This
stroke would therefore be a device to express a final closed syllable.
Thus, if it was desired to write the name of the god Diigon, it would
be written on this theory, let us say, DA-GO-XA, with a stroke
underneath the last symbol to elide its vowel. The consequences
that may follow if this assumption should at any time be proved,
and the culture which the objects represented by the various signs
indicate, are subjects for discussion in later sections of this chapter.
For further details of the analysis of the disk I must refer to my
Royal Irish Academy paper above quoted : I have dwelt on it here,
because if, as is most probable, the plumed head-dress shows that in
this disk Ave have to deal with ' proto-Philistines \ we must look to
this document and others of the same kind, with which excavators
of the future may be rewarded, to tell us something of the language
of the people with whom we have to deal.

II. TuKiR Okc;axization".
A. Political.

From the time when the Philistines first appear in their Palestinian
territory they are governed by Lords, seranim, each of whom has
domination in one of the iive chief cities, but who act in council
together for the common good of the nation. They seem, indeed, to
engage personally in duties which an Oriental monarch would certainly
delegate to a messenger. They negotiate with Delilah. They con-
vene the great triumph-feast to which Samson put so disastrous an

' I find that this comparison has been anticipated in an article in llarper^s Maffinhu
(European Edition, vol. Ixi, p. 187), which I have read smce writing the above.
The rest of the article, I regret to say, does not convince nie.

88 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

end. There is a democratic instinct manifested by the men of Ashdod
and Ekron, who peremptorily ' sunnnoned ' the council of lords to
advise tliem what to do on the outbreak of plague : just as thu
merchants of the Zakkala obliged even a forceful ruler like Zakar-
Baal to make an unsatisfiictory compromise in the matter of
Wen-Amon, and in nmch later times the people of Ekron deposed
and imprisoned a ruler who persisted in the unpopular course of
submission to Assyria. Achish makes arrangements with David,
vhich his colleamies overrule. Of the methods of election of these
officers we know absolutely nothing. From the Assyrian documents
we hear of a series of rulers over Ashdod, ftither and son, but this
does not necessarilv prove that the hereditary })rinciple was recognized.
Such a political organization was quite unlike that of the nations
round about : but the government of the Etruscans, who, as we have
seen, were probaljlv a related race, presents some analogy. There is
a consideraljle similarity between the luaimones of Etruria and the
Philistine seranim.

Nowhere do we read of a king of the Philistines.' To infer, as
has actually been done, from 1 Kings iv. 21 ('Solomon ruled over all
the kingdoms from the River unto the land of the Philistines ') that
their territory was organized as a kingdom, displays a sad lack of
a sense of humour. When Hel^rew writers speak of 'a king of Gath'
(1 Sam. xxvii. 2), ' him that holdeth the sceptre from Ashkelon '
(Amos i. 8), ' all the kings of the land of the Philistines ' (Jer. xxv. 20),
' the king [perishing] from Gaza ' (Zech. ix. 5), they obviously are
merely oft'ering a Hebrew word or periphrasis as a translation of the
native Philistine title. The same is true of the analogous expressions
in the Assyrian tablets. The case of the Etruscan 'kings' seems
exactly similar, though there appears to have been an Achish-like
king in Chisium.

In Gibeah, and probably in other towns as well, a resident officer,
like a Turkish imid'ir, was maintained at the time of their greatest
power.

It is possible tliat, if we had l)efore us all the documents relating to
the history of the Philistines, we miglit be able to divide them into
clans, corresponding perhaps in some degree to the threefold division
of the Egyptian momnneiits — Zakkala, Washasha, and Pulasati, i.e. as
we have tried to show already, Cretans, Jthodians, and Carians, The
continually recurring phrase ' Cheretliites and Pelethites ' suggests
some twofold division. Ezekiel xxv. 1(5 (' Pehold, I will stretch out
my hand upon the Philistines, and I will cut off the Cherethites ') may
^ Except Abiraelech, Gen. xxvi. 1. Exceptio prubat rec/ulam.

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTINES H9

or may not iiiiplv a similar division. Tin- rcjjort of the voimg
Egyptian (1 Sam. x\x. 14^^ implies that the name ' Cherethites ', if it
had a specific meaning apart from ' Philistines'", denoted tiie dwellers
in the extreme south of Philistine territory : and we have already
made passing note of the occurrence of the name Z'tklag; a possible
echo of the Zakkala, in that part of the country. The almost
accidental allusion to Carians in the history of the kings must not be
overlooked. But our data are so slender that very little can be built
upon them. All we can say is that the origin of the Philistines
makes it improbable that they were a single undivided tribe, and that
the scanty hints which the history affords render it still more unlikely.

Nor can we necessarily infer that the peculiar government by
a council of the lords of five cities implies that they were divided
into five tribes. For though there seems to have been an actual
division of the territory into districts, each of them under the
hegemony of one of these cities, the limits are rather indefinite;
and to judge from the scanty materials at our disposal, seem to
have varied from time to time. The recurrence of the phrase ' [such
a city] and the border thereof ^ seems to indicate a definite division
of the country into provinces governed each by one of the cities ; and
this is confirmed by David's speech to Achish,^ 'Give me a place in
one of the cities in the country {nT^'n ny nnsa), for why should thy
servant dwell in the royal city (nD^OCn T'ya) with thee ? ' A similar
polity is traceable in Etruria.

Of the division of the minor cities of the Philistine territory among
the Pentapolis — perhaps Pentarchy would be a more correct term to
use — we know very little. In the time of David's exile Ziklag was
under the control of the king of Gath. Sargon, according to one
interpretation of his insci'iption, supposes Gath itself to belong to
Ashdod. AVe may compare ' Gazara that bordereth on Azotus'
(1 Mace. xiv. B-i), though they are about sixteen miles apart, and each
only just visible on the other's horizon. Rather curiously, Joppa
and the neighboiuing villages depended, according to Sennacherib,
on Ashkiion.

Besides these towns we hear of certain unwalled villages (1 Sam.
vi. 18) which are not specified by name.

B. Mil'darij.

Certain functionaries called sarim meet us from time to time in the
history (1 Sam. xviii. 30, xxix. -J, 9). It is the sfirlm whose protest

' See Judp. i. 18, 1 Sam. v. G, 2 Kinps xviii. 8.
- 1 Sam. xxvii. j.

90 THP: SCHWEICH lectures, 1911

})revcnts David from joinini^ in the l:)attle of Gilhoa. The word is, of
course, a coninionjjlace Semitic term, and is applied in DeboralTs Song
to the princes of Issachar, and bv Zephaniali to those of Jerusalem.
Among the Philistines the otHcials denoted ])v this word were no
doubt military captains.

It is obvious throughout the whole history, from the davs of the
Medinet Habu sculptures onwards, that the military forces of the
Philistines were well organized. In 1 Samuel xiii. 5 we read of
;3(),0()0 chariots and 6,000 horsemen, which, even if the numbers
are not to be taken literally, indicates a considerable wealth in
war equipment. Elsewhere (ib. xxix. 2) we hear of 'hundreds and
thousands"', which may indicate a system of division into centuries
and regiments. Of their methods of fighting w^e have no certain
information : Judges i. 19 emphasizes their corps of war-chariots : in
the account of the battle of Gilboa the archers are specially alluded
to. Tlie ]\Iedinet Habu sculptures and the description of the equip-
ment of the champions are analysed in the following section.

C. Doinest'ir.

On the subject of family life among the Philistines nothing is
known. The high-minded sense of propriety attributed to Aliimelech
in the patriarchal narratives has already been touched upon. Samson's
relations with his Timnathite wife can hardly be made to l)ear undue
stress : a Scui'it'ic marriage of the sadlka ty])e is pictured by the story-
teller. The wife remains in her father's house and is visited by her
husband from time to time. JNIen and women apparently mingle freely
in the temple of Dagon at Gaza. No further information is vouch-
safed us.

III. Thkiii 1{i:i.u;[ox.

Of the religion of the Philistines we know just enough to whet
a curiosity that for the present seeks satisfaction in vain. The only
hints given us in the Old Testament history are as follows :

(1) Tlie closing scene of Samson's career took j)lace in a temple of
Dagon at Gaza, which must have been a large structure, as different
as possil)le from the native High Places of Palestine.

(2) In this ten)ple sacrifices were offered at festivals conducted 1)V
the 'Lords' of the Philistines (Judg. xvi. ^.'3). It is not unreasonal)le
to suppose that Samson was destined to be offered in sacrifice at the
great feast of rejoicing there descril)ed. Tliis was probably an annual
festival, occurring at a fixed time of the year, and not a special cele-
bration of the capture of Samson : because an interval of some months,
during which Samson's shorn hair grew again, must have taken place

THE CULTURE OF THE PHHJSTINES *)1

between the two events. A\ e are reminded of the .Mhciiian C-)apy//Aia,
with Samson in the role of the (/)ap/aaKos-. Human sacrifices were ottered
in the tem{)le of Mania at (4aza down to the I'ourth centnrv a. n., as we
learn from a passage presently to be (juoted from ]\Iarcus the Deacon.

(3) There was also a temple of Dagon at Ashdod, wliic h indicates
that the deity was a xmiversal god of the Philistines, not a local
divinity like the innumerable Semitic lia'alim. Here there were
priests, and here a rite of 'leaping on (or rather stepping ovei) the
threshold ' was observed. A sculptured image of the god stood in this
temple.

(4) There was somewhere a temple of Ashtaroth (Samuel) or of
Dagon (Chronicles) where the troj)hies of Saul were suspended. It is
not expressly said that this temple was in Beth-shan, to the wall
of which the body of Saul was fastened.

(5) The Philistines were struck with terror when the Ark of Yahweh
was brought among them. Therefore they believed in (a) the exis-
tence and {b) the extra-territorial jurisdiction of the Hebrew deity.
This suggests a wider conception of the limitations of divine power
than was current among the contemporary Semites.

(6) Small portable images (□''^vy) were worn by the Philistines and
carried as amulets into battle (2 Sam. v. 21). Tiiis practice lasted till
quite late (2 Mace. xii. 40).

(7) News of a victory was l)ronght to the image-houses, prol ably
because they were places of public resort, where they could be jjroclaimed
(1 Sam. xxxi. 9).

(8) At Ekron there was an oracle of Baal-zebub, consulted by the
Israelite king Ahaziah (2 Kings i. 2).

Let us clear the ground by first disposing of the last-named deity.
This one reference is the only mention of him in the Old Testament,
and indeed he is not alluded to elsewhere in Jewish literature. He
must, however, have had a very prominent position in old Palestinian
life, as otherwise the use of the name in the Gospels to denote tiie
' Prince of the Devils ' (]Matt. xii. 24, tK:c.) would be inexplicable. A hint
in Isaiah ii. 6 shows us that the Philistines, like the Etruscans, were
proverbial for skill in soothsaying, and it is not unlikely that the
shrine of Baal-zebub should have been the site of their principal
oracle. If so, we can be sure that Ahaziah was not the t)nly Isiaelite
who consulted this deity on occasion, and it is easy to understand that
l)ost-exilic reformers Avould develop and propagate the secondary
application of his name in order to break the tradition of nucIi
illegitimate practices. It is, however, obvious that the Philistines
who worked the oracle of Baal-zebub sim])ly entered into an old

92 THE SCnWEICH LECTURES, 1911

Canaanite inheritance. This is clear from the Semitic etymology
of" the name. When they took over the town of Ekron and made it
one of their chief cities, they naturally took over what was probably
the most profitable source of emolument that the town contained.
The local divinity had already established his lordship over the flies
when the Philistines came on the scene.

This was no contemptible or insignificant lordship. A man who
has passed a summer and autumn among the house-flies, sand-flies,
gnats, mosquitoes, and all the other winged pests of the Shephelah will
not feel any necessity to emend the text so as to give the Ba'al of Ekron
a ' lofty house ' or ' the l*lanet Saturn '' or anything else more worthy
of divinity ^ ; or to subscribe to Winckler's arbitrary j udgement : ' Natl'ir-
lich nicht Eliegenba'al, sondern Ba'al von Zebub, worunter man sich
eine Oertlichkeit in Ekron vorzustellen hat, etwa den Hugel auf dem
der Tempel stand' {Gesch'ichte Israels, p. S.^l). The Greek Version
lends no countenance to such euhemerisms, for it simply reads rcZ BiaA
ixvlar. Josephus avoids the use of the word Baal, and says 'he sent
to the Fly' {Ant. ix. 2. 1). The evidence of a form with final I is,
however, sufficiently strong to be taken seriously. Although the
vocalization is a difficulty, the old explanation seems to me the best,
namely, that the by-form is a wilful perversion, designed to suggest
zebel, 'dung.' The Muslim argot which turns kiy iimsih (Anastasis
= the Church of the Holy Sepulchre) into kumamah (dung-heap)
is a modern example of the same kind of bitter wit.

The Lord of Flies is hardly a fly-averter, like the Zeus' d7ro'/xi"os- of
Pliny and other writers, with whom he is frequently compared. In fact,
what evidence there is would rather indicate that the original con-
ception was a god in the bodily form of the vermin, the notion of an
averter being a later develo})ment : that, for instance, Apollo Suiiiitheus
has succeeded to a primitive mouse-god, who very likely gave oracles
through the movements of mice. That Baal-/,ebub gave oracles by.
his flies is at least proliabie. A passage of lamblichus {apud Photius,
ed. Bekker, p. 75) referring to Babylonian divinations has often been
(quoted in this connexion ; but I think that j)rol)ably mice rather
than flies are there in question. Lenormant {La divination cher: Ics
Chaldcens, p. 9")) refei's to an omen-tablet from which auguries are
drawn from the l)ehaviour or peculiarities of flies, but unfortunately
the tablet in (juestion is too broken to give any continuous sense."

' Neither will he feel any necessity to picture John the Haptist feeding on locust-
pods instead of locusts, which the fellahin still eat with apparent relish.

^ For Babylonian omens derived from various insects see Hunger, Bahylon'uiche
Tieromina in Mitt, vorderas. (Jesell. i^l9()9;, S.

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTINES 93

A curious parallel niav be cited from Scotland. In the account of"
the parish of Kirkniichael, BanHshirc, is a desciiption {Sttiti.sticdl
Account of Scotland, vol. xii, p. 4C-i) of the holy well of St. ^Michael,
which was supposed to have healing properties :

* Many a patient have its waters restored to health and many
more have attested the efficacies of their virtues. But as the pre-
siding power is sometimes capricious and apt to desert his charge,
it now [a.u. 1794] lies neglected, choked with weeds, unhononrcd,
and unfre(|uented. In better days it was not so ; for the winged
guardian, under the semblance of a fly, was never absent from his
duty. If the sober matron wished to know the issue of her husband's
ailment, or the love-sick nvniph that of her languishing swain, they
visited the well of St. Michael. Every niovemcnt of the svmpathetic
fly was regarded in silent awe ; and as he appeared cheerful or
dejected, the anxious votaries drew their presages ; their breasts
vibrated with correspondent emotions. Like the Dalai Lama of
Thibet, or the King of Great Britain, whom a fiction of the English
laAv supposes never to die, the guardian fly of the well of St. Michael
was believed to be exempted from the laws of mortalitv. To the
eye of ignorance he might sometimes appear dead, but, agreeably
to the Druidic system, it was only a transmigration into a similar
form, which made little alteration in the real identity.*'

In a foot-note the writer of the foregoing account describes having
heard an old man lamenting the neglect into which the well had
fallen, and saying that if the infirmities of years permitted he would
have cleared it out and 'as in the days of youth enjoyed the pleasure
of seeing the guardian fly'. Let us suppose the old man to have
been eighty years of age : this brings the practice of consulting the
fly-oracle of Kirkmichael down to the twenties of the eighteenth
century, and probably even later.

Leaving out Baal-zebub, therefore, we have a female deity, called
Ashtaroth (Astoreth) in the passage relating to the temple of Beth-
shan, and a male deity called Dagon, ascribed to the Philistines. We
may incidentally recall what was said in the first chapter as to the
possibility of the obscure name Beth-Car enshrining the name of an
eponymous Carian deity : it seems at least as likely as the meaning
of the name in Ilelirew, • house of a lamb.' Later we shall glance
at the evidence which the Greek writers preserve as to the peculiar
cults of the Philistine cities in post-Philistine times, which no doubt
preserved reminiscences of the old worship. In the meanwhile let us
concentrate our attention on the two deities named above.

I. AsHTORETH. At first sight we are tempted to suppose that the
Philistines, who otherwise succeeded in preserving their originality,
had from the first completely succumbed to Semitic influences in the

94 THE SCH WEIGH LECTURES, 1911

province of religion. ' As innnigrants ', says Winckler in his Geschichte
Israels, ' thev naturally adopted the civilization of the land they seized,
and with it the cultus also.' And certainly Ashtaroth or Ashtoreth
\\as par excellence the characteristic Semitic deity, and worshippers
of this goddess might well be said to have become completely
semitized.

But there is evidence that makes it doubtful whether the assimila-
tion had been more than partial. We begin by noting that Herodotus ^
specially mentions the temple of ?/ Ovj)avia ' AcfypooiTi-j as standing at
Ashkelon, and he tells us that it was the oldest of all the temples
dedicated to this divinity, older even than that in Cyprus, as the
Cyprians themselves admitted : also that the Scythians plundered
the temple and were in consequence afflicted by the goddess with
a hereditary roCcros- f^j/Aem.- The remarkable inscription found at
Delos, in which one Damon of Ashkelon dedicates an altar to his
tutelary divinities, brilliantly confirms the statement of Herodotus.
It runs :

All OYPICOI KAI ACTAPTHI HAAAICTINHI

KAI AOPOAITHI OYPANIAI eEOIC EnHKOOIC

AAMOJN AHMHTPIOY ACKAAOJNITHC

COJeEiC Ano nEIPATOJN

EYXHN

OY eEMlTON AE nPOCATEIN

AirEION YIKON BOOC GHAEIAC

'To Zeus, sender of fair winds, and Astarte of Palestine, and
Aphrodite Urania, to the divinities that hearken, Damon son of
Demetrios of Ashkelon, saved from })irates, makes this vow. It is not
lawful to offer in sacrifice an animal of the goat or pig species, or
a cow."" '"^

1 i. 105.

" Some have compared with this the outbreak of disease consequent on the
capture of the Ark. But the two are entirely indejiendent. The Scythian disease,
whatever it may have been, was not buboni(! plague, and the Philistine disease
was not a hereditary curse. (The Scythian disease is much more Hke the cess
vnindin or * childbirth pangs ' with which the men of Ulster were jjeriodically
afflicted in consequence of the curse of Macha, according to the Irish legend of
the Tii'tn Bo Cua'dw/e. This is supposed to be a distorted tradition of the custom of
the couvade, a theory which only adds difficulties to the original obscurity of the
myth.)

'■' Clermont-Ganncaw, discussing this inscription Acad, dis Jnscnpllons, 1909;,
acutely points out that ai-fdov, Ilki'jv are neuter adjectives, depending on some such
word as ^iov, so that all animals of these species are forbidden : whereas ftmnh'
animals of the cow kind alone are forbidden, so that bulls are lawful. Such limita-
tions of the admissible sacrificial annuals are well known in analogous inscrii)tions :

THE CULTURE OF THE rHHJSTINES [)r,

The Palestinian Astarte is here (listiii^iiishcd IVoiu Hie Aphrodite
of Aslikelon ; aiul though there olniously was niiieh confusion between
them, the distinction was reah From Liician Mve learn that there
were two goddesses, wlioni he keeps carefully apart, and who indeed
were distinguished by their bodily form. The goddess of Hierapolis,
of whose worship he gives us such a lurid des(rij)tion, was in human
form: the goddess of Phoenicia, wliom he calls Derketo (a Greek
corruption of the Semitic Atargatis, nny^ny), had the tail of a (ish,
like a mermaid.

The name of this goddess, as written in Sidoniaii insci iptions, was
long ago explained as a compound of "iny and nny, 'Atar and 'Ate.
These are two well-established divine names; the former is a variant
of 'Ashtart, but the latter is more obscure : it is possiblv of L^(lian
origin.- In Syriac and Talnuidic writings the compound name
appears as Tar'atha.

The fish-tailed goddess was already antiquated when Lucian wrote.
He saw a representation of her in Phoenicia {op. cit. § 14), wliich
seemed to him unwonted. No doubt he was correct in keeping the
two apart ; but it is also clear that they had ])ecome inextricablv
entangled with one another by his time. The figure of the goddess
of Hierapolis was adorned with a cesUis or girdle, an ornament
peculiar to Urania (§ 3^), who, as we learn from Herodotus, was
regarded as the goddess of Ashkelon. There was another point
of contact between the two goddesses— sacred fisli were kept at their
shrines. The fish-pond of Hierapolis is described bv Lucian
(§§ 45, 46) as being very deep, with an altar in the middle to which
people swam out daily, and with many fishes in it, some of large size
— one of these being decorated with a golden ornament on its fin.

To account for the mermaid shape of the Ashkelonite goddess
a story was told of which the fullest \ ersion is presei'ved for us by
Diodorus Siculus (ii. 4). ' In Syria is a city called Ashkelon, and not
far from it is a great deep lake full of fishes ; and beside it is a slu'ine
of a famous goddess Avhom the Syrians called Uerketo : and she has
the f^xce of a woman, and otherwise the entire bodv of a fish, for
some reason such as this ; the natives most skilful in legend fable
that Aphrodite being offended by the aforesaid goddess inspired

the triple prohibition in this case probably corrcsponcts to the triple dedication, the
purpose being to secure that none of the three deities in joint ownership of the altar
shall be offended by a sacrifice unlawful in his or her worship. Otlier inscriptions
are quoted in the same article showing a considerable intercourse between the
Ashkelonites and the island of Delos.

' De Dea Syria, 14.

- See a careful discussion in Baethgen, Beitr. 71 11".

96 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

her with furious love f'oi' a certain youth among those sacrificing:
and that Derketo, uniting with the Syrian, Ijore a daughter, and
being aslianied at the fault, caused the youth to disa])pear and
exposed the child in certain desert and stony places : and cast herself
in shame and grief into the lake. The form of her body was changed
into a fish : wherefore the Syrians even yet abstain from eating this
creature, and honour fishes as gods.' The legend is told to the same
effect by Pausanias (II. xxx. 3).

This legend is of great importance, for it helps us to detect the
Philistine element in the Ashkelonite Atargatis. An essentially
identical legend was told in Crete, tlie heroine being Britomartis or
Dictynna. According to Callimachus'' Hymn to Artemis Britomartis
was a nymph of Gortyna beloved of Artemis, whom Minos, inflamed
with love, chased over the mountains of Crete. The nymph now
liid herself in the forests, now in the low-lving meadows ; till at last,
when for nine months she had been chased over crags, and Minos was
on the point of seizing her, she leaped into the sea from the high
rocks of the Dictaean mountain. But she sprang into fishers" nets
(hLKTva) which saved her ; and hence the Cydonians called the nymph
Dictynna, and the mountain from which she had leaped called they
Dictaean ; and they set up altars to her and perform sacrifices.

The myth of the Atargatis of Ashkelon fits very badly on to the
Syrian deity. She was the very last being to be troubled with shame
at the events recorded by Diodorus Siculus : she had no special
connexion with the sea, except in so far as fishes, on account of their
extreme fertility, might be taken as typical of the departments of
life over which she presided. There can surely be little question
that the coyness of the Cretan nvmph, her leap into the sea, and
her deliverance by means of something relating to fishes, has been
transferred to the Ashkelonite divinity by the immigrants. The
Atargatis myth is more ])rimitive than that of Britomartis : the
union from which Britomartis was fleeing has actuallv taken place,
and the metamorphosis into a fish is of the crudest kind ; the ruder
Carians of the mainland might well have jjreserved an earlier phase of
the myth which the cultured Cretans had in a measure refined.

The cult of Britomartis was evidently very ancient. Her temple
was said to have ])een built by Daedalus. The name is alleged to
mean uirgo dukis ^ ; and as Ilcsychius and the Ktijmulogicon Magnum
give us respectively yXvKV and ayaOov as meanings of /-ipLTV or fiftiTov^

^ ' Crctes Dianam reliffiosissime venerantur, $pt6ofmpTTjv gentiliter nominantes
quod sermone nostro sonat uirgiiiern dulccm.'— Solinus, Polj/liistor. ch. xvi.

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTINES 97

the explanation is very likely correct. The imiiie of the barley drink,
/3pvros or jSimrov, may possibly have some connexion \\ itii this word. See
also the end of the quotation from Stephanus of Bvzantium, ante p. L5.

Athenaeus (viii. 37) gives us an anuisin<; piece of etymology on the
authority of Antipater of Tarsus, to the effect that one Gatis was
a (pieen of Syria who was so fond of fish that she allowed no one to
eat fish without inviting her to the feast — in fact, that no one could eat
arep rart8o9 : and that the connnon peoj)le thought her name was
'Atergatis' on account of this formula, and so abstained fi-om fish
altogether. He further quotes from the History of Asia by Mnaseus
to the effect that Atargatis was originally a tyrannous (pieen who
forbade the use of fish to her subjects, because she herself was so
extravagantly fond of this article of diet that she wanted it all for
herself; and therefore a custom still prevails to offer gold or silver
fish, or real fish, well cooked, which the priests of the goddess eat.
Another tale is told by Xanthus and repeated by Athenaeus in the
same place, that Atargatis was taken j)risoner by Mopsus king of
Lydia, and with her son 'Ix^i^'? (' fish ') cast into the lake near Ashkelon
(fr r?/ TTept 'AcrKaAoji'a Xi}xvr\) because of her pride, and was eaten by
fishes.

Indeed, the Syrian avoidance of fish as an article of food is a
commonplace of classical writers. A collection of passages on the
subject will be found in Selden, De Diis Syris^ II. iii.

Lucian further tells us (§ 4) that the temple at Sidon was said
to be a temple of Astarte ; but that one of the priests had informed
him that it was really dedicated to Europa, sister of Cadmus. This
daughter of King Jgenor the Phoenicians lionoured with a temple
' when she had vanished ' (fVetOT/ re a<j)avi}^ (yeyore^), and related the
legend about her that Zeus, enamoured of her, chased her, in the
form of a bull, to Crete.

Here then we have distinctly a legend to the effect that a certain
temple of the Syrian goddess was really dedicated to a deity who had
fled from an unwelcome lover, and who was directly comiected with
Crete. In fact, we have here a confused version of the Britomartis
legend on the Syrian coast. And v.hen we turn to the Metamorphoses
of Antoninus Liberalis, ch. 30, we find a version of the Britomartis
story that is closely akin to the tale told by the Sidonian priest to
Lucian. We read there that 'of Cassiepeia and Phoenix sun of
Agenor was born Carme : and that Zeus uniting with the latter
begat Britomartis. She, fleeing from the converse of men, wished to
be a perpetual virgin. And first she came to Argos from Phoenicia,
with Buze, and JMelite, and IVIaera, and Anchiroe, daughters of

98 THE SCIIWEIC'II LECTURES, 1911

Erasinos; and thereafter she went up to Cephalleiiia from Arf::;os ;
and the Cephallenians call her Laphria; and they erected a temple
to her as to a deity. Thereafter she went to Crete, and Minos seeing
her and being enamoured of her, pursued her ; but she took refuge
among fishermen, and they caused her to hide in the nets, and from
this the Cretans call her Dictynna, and offer sacrifices to her. And
fleeing from Minos, Britomartis reached Aegina in a ship, with
a fisherman Andromedes, and he laid hands on her, being desirous
to unite with her ; but Britomartis, having stepped from the ship,
Hed to a grove where there is now her temple, and there she
vanished (eyeVero a(j)av>'is) ; and they called her Aphaea, and in the
temple of Artemis the Aeginetans called the place where Britomartis
vanished Aphae, and offered sacrifices as to a deity.'' The relation-
ship to Agenor, the love-chase, and the curious reference to
' vanishing ' can scarcely be a mere coincidence. Lucian, though care-
less of detail and no doubt writing from memory, from the report
of a priest who being a Syrian was not improbably inaccurate, has
yet preserved enough of the Britomartis legend as told in Sidon to
enable us to identify it under the guise of the story of Europa.

To the same Cretan-Carian family of legends probably belongs the
sea-monster group of tales which centre in Joppa and its neighbour-
hood. The chief among them is the story of Perseus the Lycian
hero and Andromeda ; and a passage in Pliny seems to couple this
legend with that of Derketo.^ Some such story as this may have
suggested to the author of the Book of Jonah the machinery of his
sublime allegory ; and no doubt underlies the mediaeval legends of
St. George and the Dragon, localized in the neighbouring town of
Lydd. We can scarcely avoid seeing in these tales literary })arallels
to the beautiful designs which the Cretan artists evolved from the
curling tentacles of the octopus.

We are now, I think, in a position to detect a process of evolution in
these tangled tales. We begin with a connnunity dwelling somewhere
on the sea-coast, probably at the low cultural level of the tribes who
heaped the piles of midden refuse on the coasts of Eastern Denmark.
These evolved, from the porpoises and other sea-monsters that came
under their observation, the conception of a mermaid sea-goddess who
sent them their food ; and no doubt prayers and charms and magical
formulae were uttered in her name to ensure that the creeks should
be filled with fish. The sacredness of fish to the goddess would

' 'lope Phoenicum, antiquior tcrrarum inundatioiu-, ut ferunt. Insidct colleiu
praeiaccnte saxo, in quo uinculorum Andromedac uestigia ostcnduiit ; colitur illic
fabulosa <Der)ceto.' — Ilist. Nat. v. xiii. 69.

THE CULTURE OF THE rHHJSTINES 99

follow as a matter of course, ami would be most naturally expressed
bv a prohibition against eating certain specified kinds. ^ And
aetiological myths would of course be developed to account for her
fish-tail shape. The Dictynna legend, with a Volk-.s-cfyi/tologie con-
necting the name of the nymph with a lishing-net, is one version ;
the legend afterwards attached to Atargatis is another.

When the Carian-Cretan league, after their repulse from Egvpt,
settled on the Palestine coast, they of course brought their legends
with them. In their new home they found a Bona Dcd all powerful,
to whom inti'r alia fish were sacred, and with her they confuted their
own Virgo Dulcis, patroness of fishermen. Tliev l)uilt her temples —
a thing unheard-of Ijefore in Palestine — and told of her the same
tales that in their old home they had told of liritomartis. They
transferred the scene of the tragedy from tlie eastern headland of
Crete to the At//r?; of Ashkelon, and they fashioned the legend into the
form in which it ultimately reached the ears of Uiodorus Siculus.

To the legend of Atargatis Diodorus adds that the exposed child was
tended and fed by doves till it was a year old, when it was found by
one Simma, who being childless adopted it, and named it Semiramis,
a name derived from the word for ' dove "* in the Syrian language.
In after years she became the famous Babylonian (jueen : and the
Syrians all honour doves as divine in consecpience. The etymology
is of the same order as Justin's derivation of ' Sidon ' from
' a Phoenician word meaning " fish " ' : the tale Avas no doubt told
primarily to account for the sacredness of doves to the Syrian goddess.
The goddess of Ashkelon was likewise patroness of doves, and this
bird frequently figures on coins of the city.

II. Dagox was evidently the head of the pantheon of the Philistines,
after their settlement in Palestine. We hear of his temple at Gaza,
Ashdod, and, possibly, according to one version of the story of the
death of Saul, at Beth-Shan.^ Jerome in connnenting on 'Bel
boweth down, Nebo stoopeth \ in Isaiah xlvi. 1 (where some versions of
the Greek have Dagon for Nebo\ says Dagon is the idol of Ashkelon,
Gaza, and the other cities of the Philistines.^ The important temple

' Possibly some apparently irrational prohibition of a i)alatable species is at the
base of the half-humorous stories of the fireedy queen.

2 Assuming the trophy to have been exposed in the same town as the body — which
is nowhere stated— then even if it were actually hung in the temple of ' Aslitaroth '
(i. e. Atargatis-Britomartis), there was probably a temjile of Dagon also in the town,
to give rise to the parallel tradition.

3 ' Nabo autem et ipsum idolum est quod interpretutur proplutia et diuinatio,
quam post Euangelii ueritatem in toto orbe conticuisse significat. Sine, iuxta
LXX, JJiif/on, qui tanien in Hebraico non habetur. I't est idolum Ascalonis,
Gazae, et reliquarum urbium Philisthiim.'

100 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

of Gaza is mirrored for us in tlie graphic storv of tlie ckatli of
Samson, as we shall see in the following section.

In the temple of Ashdod there was an image of the god —
a thing probably unknown in the rude early Canaanite shrines.
Josejihus (Wo7-s, y. 9. 4) calls it a ^uavov, which jiossibly preserves
a true tradition that the figure was of Avood. Some interesting
though obscure particulars are given us regarding it in 1 Samuel v. 1-5.
The Ark, ca])tured at A])hek, was laid up two nights in the temple.
The first night the image of Dagon fell on its face before the Ark,
and was replaced by ' the priests of Dagon ' ; the only reference we
have to specifically religious functionaries among the Philistines.
The second night he was fallen again, and the head of the figure and
the palms of its hands were broken off and lay on the threshold.

The account of the abasement of Dagon is of considerable impor-
tance with regard to the question of the form under which he was
represented. The current idea is that he was of merman form, the
upper half man, the lower half fish. This theory is by modern
writers derived from the mediaeval Jewish commentators : Rabbi
Levi, in the third century, said that Dagon was in the figure of
a man : the first statement of his half-fish form, so far as extant
authorities go, is made by David Kimhi, who w rites, ' They say that
Dagon had the shape of a fish from his navel downwards, because
he is called Dagon [n = fish] and upwards from his navel the form
of a man, as it is said "both the palms of his hands were cut off
on the threshold".' Abarbanel appears to make the god even more
monstrous by supposing that it was the ujipei' end which was the
fishy part. But the idea must have been considerably older than
Kimhi. As we shall see presently, it underlies one of the readings
of the Greek translation : and the attem})ts at etymology in the
Onomastica ^ show clearly that the idea arose out of the accident
that :n means 'a fish', while the story in 1 Samuel v requires us
to picture the god with hands ; coupled with vague recollections of
the bodily form of the Atargatis of Ashkelon.

If we examine the passage, we note, first, that he had a head and
hands, so that he must have been at least partly human. Next we
observe that exactly the same phrase is used in describing both falls
of the idol. The first time it was unbroken, and the ])riests could

' £i.a-yujv t'ihos 1x6 Cos tj Xvmj i ]'(t('tcun Onomaxticou, cd. I.ag'urcif, p. 215): 'Dagon
piscis tristitiac' (Jerome, Liber interpret, liehraic. nom'inum, ed. Lagarde, p. 62).
The analysis suggested is pN"^1. It reminds one of Stephanus of Bj'zantium's
story about Asiidod : "Ac^'cutos" ■nuKt's Vlakaiarivq's. tqvttjv itKriaiv th twv inai'tKOui'Tav
utt' ff)v6pas 0a\daaT]i (j>vya5wi', ical dno rrji ywaiKus civtoG 'A^'a? wyufiaati', o Iotl \liJ.atpa.v\

THE CULTURE OF THE TIIILISTINES 101

put it in its place a^aiii. Tlie sc'coiul lime it was fallen again, l)ut
the projecting- parts of it were broken off. In other words, the first
fjill of the statue was just as bad as the second, except that it was
not broken : there is no statement made that on the second occasion
the image, whatever its form, snapped across in the middle. In both
cases it fell as a xcholc, being smashed the second time, just as might
happen to a china vase ; this would imply that what was left standing
and intact was not so much any part of the statue itself, as the
pedestal or some other accessory.

The difficulty lies in the words which follow the account of the
fracture of the statue — xhv INC'J p3T P"i. In the English version
these are rendered ' only [the stump of] Dagon was left\ The words
in brackets, for which the Hebrew gives no warrant, are inserted
as a makeshift to make some kind of sense of the passage. Wellhausen
ingeniously suggested omission of the I at the end of pn, supposing that
it had been inserted by dittography before the initial J of the following
word. This would make the word mean ' only his fish was left \ But
this assumes the thesis to be proved.

When we turn to the Greek Version we find that it represents
a much fuller text. It reads thus : kox Ke(l)aXi} Aayb)v [kuI aiJi(l)6T€pa
TO. tx^*? xetpwv avTOV a(l)ripf]ixiva (ttl to. iixnpoadia ajjiafpeO tKaaroL. /cat
ajXipoTepoi ol KapTTol Tdiv yetpdv avrov TreiTTcoKOTes (irl to irpoOvpov, 7rA?jy
r] pdxts Aaycov v-neX€t(p9)]. The passage in brackets has no equivalent
in the Hebrew text : it suggests that a line has been lost from the
archetype of the extant Hebrew Version.^ If with some MSS. Me
omit the first x€ipG>v (which makes no satisfactory sense with l\v>]\
this lost line would imply that Dagon'sy^T^ were also fallen on the
threshold {ap.a^e6 = Hebrew ;n2?::n). This does not accord with the
' fish-tail ' hypothesis. But, on the other hand, it shows that the fish-
tail conception is considerably older than Kim hi, for x^H'^^ must in
the first instance have been. inserted by a glossator obsessed with it.

And what are we to make of TrAlp ?/ /jci^t^ v-e\eL(})di] ? ' The
backbone of Dagon was left"* is as meaningless as the traditional
Hebrew, if not worse. But when we look back at the Hebrew we
beiiin to Avonder whether we may not here be on the track of another
Philistine word — the technical term for, let us say, the pedestal or
console on which the image stood ; or, it may be, some symbol
associated with it. Wellhausen (Text d. Buch. Sam. p. 59) has

^ Probably two adjacent lines ended thus :
and the homoeoteleuton caused the scribe's eye to wander.

102 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

put forward the suggestion that /3u)(t9 really depends on pT 'only\
But the translators would j)resuinably have understood this simple
word — thev have indeed rendered it eorreetly, by 77/\7/r. We need
a second P~i to account for pd\L^, and such, I submit, nmst have stood
in the Hebrew text. Some Avord like (let us say) "ipi, especially
if unintelligible to a late Hebrew copyist, would certainly drop out
sooner or later from the collocation (i:n "tp"i p~i. It would be very
natural for the original author to use such a word, for the sake of
the paronomasia ; and it would fully account for paxi?, which in this
case is not the Greek word at all, but a transliteration of an unknown
word in the Hebrew original. The word aixacpeO, immediately before,
which has given much trouble to the copyists of the Greek text (see
the numerous variants in Holmes and Parsons), is an example of
an even easier word in the Hebrew being transferred to the Greek
untranslated.

Further we are told that the priests and those who entered the
house of Dagon — an indication that the temple was open to ordinary
worshippers — did not tread on the threshold of the temple in Ashdod,
in consequence, it was said, of this catastrophe ; but, as the Greek
translators add 'overstepping they overstepped it' {v-eplBaLvorrci
v-ep3aLi'ov(TL). That the explanation was fitted to a much more
ancient rite we need not doubt : the various rites and observances
relating to thresholds are widespread and this prohibition is no
isolated phenomenon,^ It is not certain whether the threshold of
the Ashdod temple only was thus reverently regarded, or whether
the other Dagon temples had similar observances : the latter is
probable, though evidently the writer of Samuel supposed that the
former was the case. The possible connexion between the Ashdod
prohibition and the ' leaping on (preferably over) the threshold ' of
Zephaniah i. 9, has already been noted.

We must, however, face the fact that Dagon cannot be considered
as exclusively a Philistine deity, even though the Semitic etymologies
which have been sought for his name are open to question. There
are n ' fish ', as already mentioned, and pn ' corn \ Philo Byblios
ftwoured the second of these. The inscription of Eshmuna/ar, king
of Sidon, is well known to refer to Joppa and Dor as |n ;'-|S*, which
seems at first sight to mean 'the land of Dagon". But more probably
this is simply a reference to that fertile region as 'tlie land of corn \
However we have, through Philo, leferences associating Dagon with
the Phoenicians. In the Sanclumiathon cosmogony reported in the

' On tlie whole subject see II. C. Truiuhiill, Thu Tlirfshold Covenant, <»• the
Beffinniiuj of Reliyiouii Rites (Edinburgli, ISiXi .

TIIK CULTURE OV TIIi: PIIILISTINKS 103

fragments of Philo we have an aceount of his hirtli from Ouranos
and Ge,' with his brethren Kh)s and Kronos and Baetvlos ; he is
equated to ^ircor ' corn \ which is a})parently personified; and by
virtue of tliis equation he is identified with a Zti/j 'ApoTpto'i. All
this is very nebulous : and not more definite is the curious note
respecting the gods Taautos, Kronos, ]3agon and the rest being
symbohzed by sacred letters.- If these passages mean anything at
all, they imply that the people who taught the Phoenicians the use
of letters (and possibly also of baetylic stones) also imparted to them
the knowledge of the god Dagon. But stories which ostensibly reach
us at third hand afford a rather unsafe apparatus cr'it'icus.

In Palestine itself there is clear evidence of the presence of Dagon
before the coming of the Philistines. A certain Dagan-takala con-
tributed two letters ' to the Tell el-Amarna correspondence. By
ill-luck they do not mention the place of which he was apparentlv
the chieftain, nor do they tell us anything else to the point : the one
letter is merely a protestation of loyalty, the other the usual petition
for deliverance from the Aramaean invaders. 'Dagan'is not here
preceded by the usual determinative prefix of divinity ; but neither
is the name so preceded in the references to the town of Beth-Dagon
in the inscriptions of Sennacherib.

This name, Beth-Dagon, appears in several Palestinian villages.
They are not mentioned in the Tell el-Amarna correspondence ; and
we might fairly infer that they were Philistine foundations but for the
fact that the name appears in the list of Asiatic towns conquered by
llamessu III at IMedinet Habu — a list probably copied from an earlier
list of llamessu 11. There seems no possibility of escaping the con-

elusion that I- j ^ ^ () ] ^ f ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ Bty-

l)kn, which appears in this list, is meant one of the towns called
Beth-Dagon.^

Of these villages, one was in the tribe of Asher, another in
Judah. The southern village described by Jerome^ as of large size,

1 Ttvvarai 5« tovto) dSf\ij>f) (ic ru/v irpotipiiiifi'wv ■(] Kal (kKtjOt] Tij, /cai Sia tu KaKXoi aw
avTTJ; (prjalif iKaKtaav ttjv ifiwi'Vfjiov yfji'. 6 5^ tovtodv vaTtjp o vipiaroi iv av/i0o\fi Or]pi(iji>
T(\(VTr]dai dipif paiOj] , cu X°'^^ "''' ^vaias ol iratSei fTiKtaay. YlapaKa^uuv 5t o Ovpafoi tt/i'
TOO narpui 0Lp\f]v dyfrai Trpus ydfiov ttjv d5eA.<f ^f T^f, nat noitirai i( avrrjs iratSaj riaaapa^,
'HA.oi' riv Kal Kpuvov Kal BairvKov Kal Aa7u;»' os iari Sj'toii' kuI 'ATXavra. — Frag. Philo
Byblios 13, Miiller, Fragmm. iii, p. 5(i7.

- npo Se TOxiTojv Ofoi TdavTos nifir](jdfj.tvoi T(iv ovpavuv tuv 6fwv uffts, Kpui'ov tc kqI
Aay^JfOT Kal rwv \onrwv, SifTVTTwrrf roiis Ifpovi (Ttoix*"'"' xapaKrrjpa's. — ib. p. 569.

' Winckler, -21,3. 216 ; Knudtzon, 317, 318.

* See Max Miiller, Egyptinn Researches, i. +9, plate 68.

^ De situ et nominihus locurum, ed. Lagarde, p. 138.

104 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

was in his time called Caferdago, between Diospolis and Jamnia
(Lydd and Yebnah). Jerome's village is probably to be identified
Avith a ruin known as Dajun, dose by the present village of Beit
Dejan ; the latter has })reserved the old name and is ])uilt on a
mound which is possibly the old site.

Moreover, the name Dagan appears in Mesopotamia : there seems
no longer to be any doubt that a certain group of cuneiform signs,
relating to a deity, is to be read Du-gan. In Babylonia it enters
into the composition of proper names of about Sl'OO n. c. : a king
dated 2145 b. c. was Idin-Dagan and he had a son Isme-Dagfin : a seal-
cylinder exists of a certain Dagan-abi son of Ibni-Dagan. In Assyria
we find it in the name of Dagan-bllu-usur, eponym of the year
879 B.C.: and the name is several times coupled with that of Anu^
in cosmogonies and in invocations of various Assyrian kings. The
name disappears after the ninth century : the late reference to Dagon
in the Hebrew version of Tobit, chap, i^, speaking of Sennacherib
being killed iniyu jiiT '•Js^ \h^nrb Djnrw* ny:;'n 'at the hour when he
went in to pray to his idol Dagon \ is not of any special importance.

The fragments of Berossos relate how originally the people of
Babylon lived like animals, without order : but a being named
Oannes rose out of the Erythraean sea, with a complete fish-body,
and a man''s head under the fish-head, and human feet and voice.
This being was a culture-hero, teaching the knowledge of the arts,
writing, building, city-dwelling, agriculture, &c., to men : he rose
from the sea by day, and returned to it at sunset.

Other fragments of Berossos tell us that Oannes was followed by
similar beings, who appeared from time to time under certain of the
antediluvian kings. There were in all seven, the second and probably
the following four being called Annedotos, and the last being called
Odakon {'iloaKcuv or 'OoaKcoi'). The last resembles ' Dagon' in out-
ward form : but the elaborate discussion of Hrozny " has shown that
the comparison between the two cannot stand : that the -oiv of
'HbttKitiv is a mere termination : that tlie names Oannes and Odakon
(not however Annedotos, so far as has yet been discovered) have their
prototypes in Sumerian, and cannot be equated to the Babylonian
and Assyrian Dagan. The sole evidence for the fish-form of Dagan
therefore disappears. The statenuiits of Damascius {dc Principiis,

' See Jensen, Kosmolof/ie der Bahylonier, ])p. I l!»-4,)(j, and Paton's article * Dagan '
in Hastings's Enryrlojiaedia of liellijion and i'Aliirs.

^ Ed. Neubauer, p. 2o, xlvii.

" Sumerisch-h(ilii^loni.'<rlii Mi/f/im von dim Uutli Alnni;/ (IMittli. der vorderas. Gesell.
(1903), 5,.

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTLNES 105

c. 125) about a Babylonian divine pair, Auxo!>^ <'iii(l ^a^i'i ' add uotliinii;
to the j)roblem : as Rev. P. Rovlan and Mr. Alton have both pointed
out to nie, the A is a mistake for an A in both cases, and the beings
referred to are evidently Lahiuii and Lahainu.

That Dagan and the pre-Philistine Dagon of Palestine are one and
the same being ean scarcely be questioned. Ilro/nv {oj). (it. \). lO'i)
points out that the difference of the vowel is no dillicullx, csjiecially
as the name appears once in Assyrian as an element in a proper name
in the form Daguna. Rut we may perhaps ask if the post-lMiilistine
deity was identical with the pre-Philistine god, and whither there
may not have been a conHation analogous to that which has taken
place between Rritomartis and Atargatis.

It is relevant to notice here in passing that the Philistine religion
never had any attraction for the reactionarv kings of the Hebrews.
Only in a rather vague passage (Judges x. 6) is there any indication
of the influence of Philistine worship on that of the Israelites. Else-
where we read of altars built to the abomination of the Zidonians, of
Moab, of the Ammonites, but never of the Philistines. The solitary
exception is the consultation of the Ekronite oracle, which, as we have
seen, was not Philistine at all. In spite of the semitization of the
Philistines during the latter part of the Hebrew monarchy, their
cult still remained too exotic to attract the Semitic temperament.

Now strange though it may seem, there is a possibility that the
Philistines brought Avith them from their western home a god whose
name was similar to Dagon. We have not found any trace of him in
or around Crete : the deciphermen I of the Minoan tablets may possibly
tell us something about this in the future. But the Etruscans, kins-
men of the Philistines, had a myth of a certain Tages, who appeared
suddenly^ from the earth in the guise of a boy, and who, as they
related, was their instructor in the arts of soothsaying. This took j^lace
' when an Etruscan named Tarchon was ploughing near Tarijuinii ''
— names which immediately recall the Tarkhu, Tarlcou-dcmofi, and
similar names of Asia Minor.^ Festus {siih voce) describes Tages as
a ' genii filius, nepos louis \ As the Etruscans rejected the letter D,

^ Tuiv hi ^ap^dpo^v ioiKaat Ba^v\wi'toi fiiu ttjv filav twv iJKwv (^PX^" c^J'l TapUvai Zio
hi TTOiftv TavOi Koi 'A-naawv^ riiv (j.iv 'Airaawv dvSpa ttjs TavO't Troiovvra ravriji' oi fj.i]Tepa
Oiwv uvo/xd^ovTis (( Sjv /xovoftvfj iraiba yfvvrjOfji'ai tov tiluvuiv avTuv oifiat tuv i'oijtuu
KuCjiOV iK tSjv hvoiv dp\uiv irapayoixfvov. 'Ef 5e tuii' avrSjv dWrji/ yd'tdv npo€\$ni\ AaxTjy
Kal Adxov. Eira av rplr-qv ixrwv avTuiv, Kiaaapfi Kal 'Aaaaipof, ff uiv yti'taOai rpfis 'Avuv
Kal 'IWivui/ Kal 'Avv. Tov 5( 'AoO icai Aavmjs v'luv yfviaOai riv B^Xor, or hi]pnoi'pyuv tii-ai
ipaalv.

^ Cf. the sudden appearances of Britoniartis in Aegina, rausaiiias, II. xxx. 3.

^ See Cic. de Divhiadone, ii. 23.

loG Tin: sciiwijcii ixcTrRES, 1911

Tages is closeh' coin})arablo to a name beginning Avitii Dag- ; and
indeed the -es termination is probably not part of the Etruscan name,
but a nominative termination added by the ft)reign writers who have
reported tlie story. If the Philistines brought such a deity with them
in tiieir Syrian home, they might well have identified him with the
god Dagon, whom they found there before them.

It is difficult otherwise to explain how Dagan, whose worship seems
to have been on the whole of secondarv importance, should have
acquired such supreme importance among the foreigners.

But after all. the Canaanite Dagon and the hypothetical Philistine
Dag- may have been one — the latter having been borrowed by the
'proto-Philistines'', as we may for convenience call them, at some
remote period. The intercourse which led to the adoption of clav
tablets as writing materials by the Cretans at the begiiming of the
middle Minoan period, and to the adoption of certain details of legal
procedure (if there be any value in the conjectures given in this book
regarding the Phaestos disk) — may well have led to the Ijorrowing of
the ffod of one nation bv the other.

The FAtjmologicon Magnum calls Dagon — or rather Bjjraycoz-, sub-
stituting the place Beth-Dagon for the name of the god — 6 KpoVos

V-d ^l^OLVLKMl'.

After the collapse of the Philistine power in David's time, we hear
nothing more about Dagon except the vague guesses of etymologists
and mvthographers. The temple, and presumably the worshi{) of
the deity, under the old name, lasted down to the time of the
Maccabees in Aslulod (1 Mace. x. 83, 84). But in Gaza the case was
different. Here powerful Hellenic influences introduced numerous
foreign deities, which, however, there is every reason to believe were
grafted on to the old local gods and numina. Josephus tells us of
a temple of Apollo ; but our leading source is the life of Porphyrins,
bishop of Gaza at the end of the fourth and beginning of the fifth
century, written by his friend the deacon Marcus.

This valuable little work gives us a picture of the last struggle of
heathenism, of which Gaza was the storm-centre. The descriptions
are terse but vivid. We see Porphyrins, after his appointment to
the bishopric, making his way paiiifullv from Diospolis (Lydd)
because the heathen living in the villages on tlie way erected barriers
to prevent his passing, and annovcd him bv l)urning substances that
gave forth fetid odours. After thcv had arri\ed, a drought fell in
the same year, which the heathen ascribed to the wratii of Marna
their god, on account of the coming of i'orpiiyrius. For two months
no rain fell, ncjtwithstanding their pravers to Marna ('whom they say

THE cri/rnu: of t\u: piiiustines iot

is Zeus'') in his capacity of lord of rain. There was a ph\ce of praver
outside the city, and the whole of the heathen population frequented
this for intercession to the kv/ho9 tQv 6\xi-ii)U)v. This place was no
doubt a sanctuary with an ancient tradition ; most probably to Ijc
identified with tiie Aldioina, or place of Zeus Aldemios. Tiiis,
according to the Etijiiiolog'u-oii Magnuvi, was the name of the chief
god of Gaza, and a god of fertility ; [)r()l)al)ly therefore identical with
Marna.^ Wc hear of the same sanctuary in the Talmud : near (ia/a
was a place called Yerld or 'Itloza (nn^i^y, also written r^cx and C'^l;n)
out>ide the city where an idol was worshipped.'-' In the slcjucI we
learn that Porphyrins took from the Aldioma thi- stones with which
he built the church erected by him on the site of the Marneion.

Near modern Gaza is a hill, crowned by the shrine of a Mu>lim
saint called SJte'ikh Miuitar. As usual, this true belieyer has succeeded
to the honours of a pagan diyinity. Muntar means ' a watch tower ' ;
but possibly the name is a corruption of Marna or [Britojmartis.

The name Marna is capable of being rendered in Aramaic,
Mar-na,'' ' Our Lord,' and not improbably this is its actual meaning.
If so, it is probably an illustration of the widespread dislike to, or
actual prohibition of, the mention of the real name of a diyinity.'*
At some time a hesitation to name the god — who can hardly be other
than Dagon — had arisen : the respectful expression ' Our Lord ' had
by frequent use become practically the personal name of the diyinity,
and had assumed a Greek form 'yiapva^, with a temple called the
^\apva.ov, the chief temple of Gaza.

It is likely that Gaza at the time claimed to be a sacred city : the
rigidness of the tabu against carrying a dead body into it suggests
that such an act would pollute it. The Christians had serious
trouble, soon after the coming of Porphyrins, on account of the case
of one Barochus, a zealous young Christian, who was set upon by
heathen outside the city and beaten, as was thought, to death. His
friends happening to find him lying unconscious, wished to carry him

1 Aldemios was probably another name of Marna. The Etymulogicon Magnum
gives us 'A\5r/^tos 77 'AASos] d Zei/j [oj] iv Ta^Tj rrji Svpi'aj rifxaraf -rrapd To aKSalia;, to
av^avw o inl rfji ai^rjaftus ruiv Konwl'i'. — FAyin. Mai/ii. cd. Gaisford, col. .>S. ;?(».

^ Neubauer, Geog. d. Talmud. With Yerld coiniiare Jin Yn-dth, tlu- name of
a spring outside the important city of Gezer.

3 It is probably a mere coincidence that there was a river-god of the same name
at Ephesus, mentioned on coins of that city of the time of Domitian wWAPNAC
or E<t>ECU2N A\APNAC), as well as in an inscription from an acjucduct at Ephesus,
now in the British Museum. See Uoscher, LtJ-iron, s. v.

♦ The word Mar, ' Lord,' is used in the modern Syrian church as a title of respect
for saints and bishops. A pagan name 3nn?2 (= ^n" nC, 'Mar has given')
illustrates its application to divinitj'.

108 THE SCHWEICII LECTURES, 1911

home; but only sucfceded in doing so with the greatest difficulty,
owing to the upi-oar caused by their carrying the apparent corpse into
the city.

Stirred by eyents of this kind, Porphyrins determined to invoke the
ciyil power to aid him in his struggle with heathendom, and sending
IVIarcus to Constantinople obtained an order for the closing of the
temples of Gaza, As usual, howeyer, in the East, the official
responsible for the carrying out of the order did so with one hand,
allowing the other hand to be ' greased ' to undo the work sur-
reptitiously. In other words, Ililarios, the adjutant sent to carry out
the order, and especially charged to close the ]\Iarneion and to put
a stop to the consultation of the oracle, while appearing to execute
the duty connnitted to him, secretly took bribes to permit the rites
of heathen religion to ])e carried on as before. Porphyrins therefore
went in })erson to Constantinople; interyiewed the em})ress Eudoxia;
obtained her favour by the prophecy of the birth of a son to her,
which was fulfilled by the birth of Theodosius ; and obtained her
intercession with the emperor to secure the closing of the temples.
So Porphyrius returned with his suite, and Avas received at Gaza with
jubilation on the part of the Christians, and corresponding depression
on that of the Pagans.

Some valuable hints are preserved to us by Marcus of the nature of
the worship thus destroyed. A few excerpts from his work may be
here giyen.

' As we entered the city, about the place called the Four AVays,
there was standing a marble })illar, which they said was Aphrodite ;
and it was above a stone altar, and the form of the pillar was that of
an undraped woman, ix'-^vai-js u\a to. aaxi]ixa (jiuwuixera,^ and they all
of the city used to honour the pillar, especially the women, lighting
lamps and burning incense. For they used to say of her that she
used to answer in a dream those who wished to enter into matrimony;
and telling falsehoods tlu'V used to deceive one another.' The worship
of this statue evidently retained some of the most lurid details of the
High Place worship. This statue was the first to be destroyed — by
a miracle, Marcus says, on the exhibition of the Cross. He is probably
mindful of the prostration of Dagoii on the .\rk being brought into
his presence.

Ten days afterwards Cynegius, the emjjcror's messenger, arrived
with a band of soldiers, to destroy the temples, of which there were
eight — of the Sun, Aphrodite, Apollo, Kore (Persephone), Hekate.

' The fisli-tail li.is now (]is;i]ij)earc-(i.

THE CULTUKK Ol 11 IK FIIILIS TINKS 109

the Heroeion, the Tychaion or teiiiplc of tht- Lnrk (rt^'xi/) of the city,
and the Marneion, or temple of the Crete-boni Zeus, the most
honourable of all the temj)les, which has already been mentioned.
Besides these there were a countless number of minor deities in the
houses and the villages. The destroying party first made its way to
the Marneion. The })riests, however, had been forewarned, and
blocked the doors of the inner chamber with great stones. In the
inner chamber or adytum they stoi'ed the sacred furniture of the
tem})le and the images of the god, and then tied by otiier exits, of
which it was said there were several, opening out of the adyta of the
temple in various directions. Baffled therefore for the time, the
destroying l)arty made their way to the other temples, which they
demolished ; Porphyrins, like another Joshua, laying under an
anathema any of the Christians who should take to himself any
plunder from the treasuries. This work occupied ten days, and the
question of the fate of the Marneion was then discussed. Some were
for razing it, some for burning it, others again wished to preserve it
and after purifying it, to dedicate it for Christian worship. Porphyrius
therefore proclaimed a fast with prayer for Divine guidance in the
difficulty. The Divine guidance came in strange wise ; and though it
has nothing to do with the Philistines, the story is so curious that it
is wx'll worth relating exactly as Marcus himself tells it. As the
people, fasting and praying, were assembled in the church, a child of
seven years, standing with his mother, suddenly cried out in the
Syrian tongue, * Burn the temple to the ground : for many hateful
things have taken place in it, especially human sacrifices. And in
this manner burn ye it. Bring licjuid pitch and sulphur and lard,
and mix them together and smear the brazen doors therewith, and lay
fire to them, and so the whole temple will burn ; it is impossible any-
other way. And leave the outer })art {tov t^(liiTtj)ov) with the enclosing
wall {-rrepLftoXos). And after it is burnt, cleanse the place and there
build a holy church. I witness to you before God, that it may not
be otherwise : for it is not I who speak, but Christ that speaketh in
me.' And when they all heard they wondered, and glorified God.
And this portent came to tlie ears of the holy bishop (Porphyrius),
who stretching his hands to heaven gave glory to God and said,
' Glory to Thee, Holy Father, who hast hidden from the wise and
prudent, and hast revealed even these things to babes.' When the
people were dismissed from the church he sunnnoned the child and
his mother to him in the bishop's house, and setting the child apart
he said to the woman, 'I adjure thee by the Son of the Living God to
say if it was on thy suggestion or of some other known to thcc that

no THK SCHWEICII LECTURES, 1911

thy son spoke as he did concerning the ]\Iarneion.' The woman said,
'I dehvei' nivself to the dread and awful judgement-seat of Christ, if
I had fore-knowledge of any of those things that my son spoke this
day. But if it seem fit to thee, behold the boy, take him and
examine him with threats, and if he said tliese things on the
suggestion of anv, he will confess it in fear ; if he says nothing
else it will be clear that he was insj)ired by the Holy Spirit." So
to make a long story short, the boy was brought in, and the bishop
bade him speak and say who had put these words in his mouth —
brandishing a whip as he spoke. The ])oor bewildered child kept
silence, even though 'We who were around him' — INIarcus speaks as
an eve-witness — repeated the questions likewise with threats. At last
the child opened his mouth and made exactly the same utterance as
before, Ijut this time in Greek — a language of which, as appeared on
inquirv from the mother, he was ignorant. This settled the matter,
and sealed the fate of the Marneion. The bishop gave three pieces
of money to the mother, but the child, seeing them in her hand, said
in the Svrian tongue, ' Take it not, mother, sell not thou the gift of
God for monev ! ' So the woman returned the money, saying to the
bishop, ' Pray for me and my son, and recommend us to God." And
the bishop dismissed them in peace. It is a strange coincidence that
the first and last events in the recorded history of Philistia have
a mantic prodigy as their central incident !

The reference to human sacrifices is for our innnediate purpose the
most noteworthy point in this remarkable story. The sequel was
equally remarkable. The method approved by the oracle was applied,
and immediately the whole temple, which on the first occasion had
resisted their assaults, was wrapped in flames. It ])urnt for many
davs, during which there was a good deal of looting of treasures ; in
the course of this at least one fatal accident occurred. At the same
time a house-to-house search for idols, books of sorcery, and the like
relics of heathenism, was cfri'cted. and anything of the kind discovered
was destroyed.

When the plan of the new church came to be discussed some were
for rel)uilding it after the fashion of the old temple ; others for
making a complete break with heathen tradition by erecting a building
entirelv different. The latter counsel ultimately prevailed. Important
for us is the _/ac^ of the dispute, Ix'cause, a propos thereof Marcus has
given us a few words of description wliich tell us something of what
the building was like. It was cvlindric.il. \\ itli two porticoes, one inside
the other ; in the middle like a ciljoriuin (the canopy above an altar)
'puii' (1 out" (i.e. j)i-e.^nmablv domed) but stretciied upwards ( = stilted),

THE CULTUKE OF THE rillLISTINES 111

and it had other things fit for idols and suited to the liorri]>le and
lawless concomitants of idolatry.'

This clearly takes us far away from the inc<^-iiroii plan of the old
Dagon temple. We have to do with a peristyle circular building,
not unlike the Roman Pantheon, but with a stilted dome and sur-
rounded by two rows of colunms (see the sketch, p. 124). The
'other things' suita])le for idol-worship were presumably the adyta
of which we have already heard, which must have been either recesses
in the wall or else underground chambers. The apparently secret
exits made use of by the priests seem to favour the latter hypothesis.
Not improbably they were ancient sacred caves. I picture the temple
to myself as resembling the Dome of the Kock at Jerusalem, substi-
tuting the double portico for the aisle that runs round that building.

In clearing off the ashes and di-hris of the IMarneion, Porphyrins
came upon certain marbles, or a ' marble incrustation ' — jj.ajifj.djona-i'i
— which the IVIarna-worshippers considered holy and not to be trodden
upon, especially by women. We are of course reminded of the
threshold of Dagon at Ashdod, but as we have no information as to
the part of the temple to which the marbles belonged, we cannot say
if there was any very close analogy. Porphyrius, we are told, paved
the street Avith these sacred stones, so that not only men, but ' women,
dogs, pigs, and beasts ' should be compelled to tread upon them — a
proceeding which \ve learn caused more pain to the idolaters than even
the destruction of their temple. ' But yet to this day \ says Marcus,
' most of them, especially the women, will not tread on the marbles.'

On coins of Gaza of the time of Hadrian a different temple is
represented, with an ordinary distyle front. This ty})e bears the
inscription GAZA MARNA, with figures of a male and female
divinity, presumably Mama and Tyche. The coin is evidence that
the distyle temple — the old nlegaron type — survived in Gaza till
this time, and it is not improbable that the IVIarneion destroyed
by Porphyrius was built immediately afterwards. The resemblance
to the Dome of the Rock at Jerusalem may be more than merely
superficial. This structure was built on the ruins of Hadrian's
temple of Jupiter, the Dodecapylon, which he erected over the sacred
Rock, when he made his determined effort to paganize the Holy City.
We have no description of this building, which was already in ruins
in A. D. 33;3 ; but its situation seems to require a round or synnnetri-
cally polygonal structui'e, and the name dodecapylon suggests a twelve-

^ 2T|)077i/A,o<i5ts -^ap vn^pxfy, irfpi^tpKrjfxivot' Svalv aroali dWj]\otacuT(pais, to St fxiaov
avTOV T]V dva<pvaT]T<Jv KttSdipiov nal dvamaixivov eis v.pos, iixiv 5« koI dXKa rivd a rots
(iScuAoiy iirptnfv, dOira 5e Trp&s ra '^ivupava vapd tjjv ilSo:Xo)xavCv fivaapd t« koi dOtfiiTa.

112

THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

sided l)uil(ling. The Dome of the Kock (an octagon) may well have
been built after this model ; and the Pantheon, which has also been
compared with the building indicated by the account of Marcus, is
likewise of the time of Hadrian. The Marneion, therefore, might
have been erected under the auspices of that enthusiastic builder, or
at least after the model of other buildings which he had left behind

Ficf. 5. Coins of (i;iza and Asbkeloa :— 1. Coin of Gaza showing Temple of
Marna. 2. Coin of (iaza l)earing the figure and nameof lo, and a debased Plioeni-
c-ian M, the symbolic initial of Mania.' 3. Coin of Gaza bearing tlie figure and
name of Minos. 4. Coin of (Jaza I)earing the initial of Mania. 5. Coin of
Ashkeloiij with the sacred fishpond. G. Coin of Ashkelon, with figure of
Astarte. 7. Coin of Aslikelon, Avith figure bearing a dove : below^ a sea-
monster. B. Coin of Ashkelon, with figure of a dove.

him in Palestine. This would give a date for the break with the
tradition of the old building. The sacred marbles miglit well have
been some stones preserved from the old structure, and on that account
of peculiar sanctity.

The rest of the acts of Por])hyrius do not concern us, though we
may note that there was a well in the courtyard of the Marneion,

1 ToT( uvofxa^ufxevov i'l ianv tvOua vpOfj fxla koX rpeis TiKayiot in' avTrjs . . . vapa Fa^aioii
rov AiJs. — Dainascius.

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTINES 113

as we learn from the account of a miracle performed by him soon
after the erection of the church.

Jerome, in his Life of Hilarion^^ narrates sundry miraculous events,
especially a remarkable victory in the circus l)y a Christian combatant,
in which even the pagans were compelled to acknowledge Mamas
victus a Christo. Epiphanius of Constantia in his Ancoratus, p. 109,^
enumerating a number of persons who have been deified, speaks of
Manias the slave of Asterios of Crete as having so been honoured in
Gaza. Here again the persistent Cretan tradition appears, but what
the value or even the meaning of this particular form of it may be
we cannot say. Mr. Alton has ingeniously suggested to me that
Epiphanios saw and misunderstood a dedicatory inscription from the
old sanctuary inscribed MAPNAt ACTERIGOt KPHTATENHt.

Outside Gaza there is scarcely any hint of Marna-worship. The
name is used as an expletive in Lampridius's Lfe of Alexander Severus:
and Waddington ^ reports an inscription from Kanata (Kerak), built
into a modern wall, and reading A N N H A[0]C KAMACANOY EHO H C E
All MAPNAt TCOt KYPICOi. But AnnGlos very likely was a native
of Gaza. A well-known statue found many years ago near Gaza, and
now in the Imperial Ottoman Museum at Constantinople, has been
supposed to represent IMarna ; but there is no evidence of this. The
eccentric Lady Hester Stanhope found a similar statue at Ashkelon,
but destroyed it.

Certain heathenized Jews of Constantia adored as deities Marthus
(or Marthys) and Marthana, the daughters of a certain false prophet
of the time of Trajan, by name Elzai * : but this is hardlv more than
a coincidence.

In Ashkelon, also, there was a special deity in late Pagan times.
This was 'Ao-kAtjttioj Aeoi;ro{)xo?, once referred to by Marinus, writing
in the fifth century a. d.'' It may be that this is the deity spoken of
in the Talmud, which mentions a temple of Saripa (N^ni) at Ashkelon,
evidently a form of Serapis.^ But we know nothing of ' Asclepius the
lion-holder ^ but his name. Probably the name of the town suggested
a dedication to the similarly sounding Asclepius, just as it suggested
the word AC4)AAHC on the coins of the city. Asclepius does not
appear, so far as I can find, on any coins of Ashkelon. Mars, Neptune,

1 Ed. Migne, xxiii. 27.

^ Ed. Migne, xliii. 209 : koI Mapvas SovKos 'Aartptov rov KprjTus napa ra^atois.

^ Inscriptions, in Le Bas, Voyaija arch6ologique en Grcce . . .

* Epiphanius, Contra Ilaeres. I. xix.

^ 'AWa Kal Mapvav Fa^aiov iifivovaa Kal 'A(Tic\T]niuv Aiovrovxov 'AoKaXuviTqv kol
Qvavdpirrjv dWov 'Apa^iois noXvTifj.rjTov 6(uv. — Marinus, Vita Procli, ch. 19.

* Hildesheiraer, Beitriige znr Geog. Paliistinas, p. 3.

lU THE SCHAVEICH LECTURES, 1911

the genius of the city, and Aphrodite Urania, are the deities generally
found on the coins : once or twice the latter is represented standing
on lions. ^ On other coins an erection is represented which may be
the Atu"/ or fish-pond for which the sanctuary was famous (see fig. 5,
p. 112).

IV. Their Place in History and CiyiLiZATioN

A people, or rather a group of jieoples, the remnant — the de-
generate remnant if you will — of a great ciyilization, settled on the
Palestine coast. They found before them a servile aboriginal popu-
lation ready to their use, who could relieve them of the necessary
but unaccustomed labour of extracting life and wealth from the
prolific soil. They were thus free to cultivate the commercial fEicilities
which were already established in the land they made their own.
Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ashdod had harljours which opened the way
to trade by sea. The great land route from Egypt to Babylon
passed right through the heart of the country from end to end —
Gaza was from the beginning the principal mart for northern Arabia :
in the expressive words of Principal G. A. Smith, we hear the jingling
of shekels in the very name of Ashkelon. Corn and wine were pro-
duced abundantly within their favoured territory, even in years when
the rest of the country suffered famine ; an active slave-trade (one
of the most lucrative sources of wealth) centred in Philistia, as we
learn from the bitter denunciation of Amos, Small wonder then
that the lords of the Philistines could offer an enormous bribe to
a wretched woman to betray her husband. Small wonder that the
Philistines were the carriers and controllers of the arts of civilization
in Palestine.

The settlement of the Philistines in Palestine falls in that j)eriod
of fog, as we may call it, when the iron culture succeeds the bronze
in the Eastern Mediterranean. Recent excavations have given us
a clear-cut picture of the development of civilization during the
bronze age ; that wonderful history which was sketched in its barest
outline in the course of Cha])tcr I. Then a cloud seems to settle
down on the world, through which we can dimly perceive scenes of
turmoil, and the shifting of nations. When the mist rolls away it is
as though a new world is before us. We see new powers on earth,
new gods in heaven : new styles of architecture, new methods of
warfare : the alphabet has been invented, and above all, iron has
become the metal of which the chief implements are made. Crete
and the great days of Egypt belong to the past : the glorious days
of classical Greece are the goal before us.

' See De Saulcy, Numismatique de hi Terre Sa'uite.

THE CULTURE OF TIIK IMIILTSTIXES 115

The chief interest of the PhiHstines lies in this, that their history
falls almost entirely within this period of obscurity, wlien the iron
age of Europe was in its birth-throes. They and their kin, the
Zakkala in the east and Turisha in the west, bridge the gap between
the old world and the new. It is owing to them that the remi-
niscences of the days of Crete were handed across a couple of
troubled centuries, to form the basis of new civilizations in Greece,
in Italy, and in the East.

Our materials for estimating the culture of the Philistines and
their place in civilization are the following : (1) The Phaestos Disk ;
(2) The ^Nledinet Habu sculptures ; (3) The results of excavation
in Philistia ; (4) Scattered Biblical references.

(1) On the Phaestos Disk ai'e forty-five characters. Of some of
these it is not very easy to determine the signification, but others
have some value as indicating the nature of the civilization of those
w^ho invented its script, and its analogues.

The writing, running from right to left, is in the same direction
as the Carian inscriptions, but not as the Minoan linear tablets.

The plumed head-dress of the sign here called M has been referred to
as being the link which connects this disk with Caria on the one
hand and with the Philistines on the other. A. J. Reinach (Revue
archeologique, Ser. V, vol. xv, pp. 26, 27) publishes Sardinian statuettes
showing the same form of head-dress. The Sardinians being probably
a later stage in the history of one branch of the sea-peoples, it is
natural that they should show an analogous equipment.

The sign a, a man running, shows the simple waist-band which
forms the sole body-covering of the Keftian envoys.

The sign h, a captive with arms bound behind, has no more
covering than a girdle. The symbol z appears to represent a hand-
cuff or fetter. Perhaps Samson was secured with some such fastening.

The sign c from its small size appears to represent a child. He
is clad in a tunic fitting closely to the body and reaching barely to
the hips. No doubt, as often in Egypt ancient and modern, in some
of the remoter parts of Palestine and among the Bedawin, young
children went naked.

Fig. d represents a woman. She has long flowing hair, and seems
to be wearing a single garment not unlike the fiistan of the modern
Palestinian peasant, the upper part of which, however, has been
dropped down over the lower so as to expose the bodv from the
girdle upwards. Hall, in a recent article in the Journal of Hellcuir
Studies, shows that the figure has Mycenaean analogies.

I 2

116

THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

Fig. e, with the sha^•ed head, perhaps represents a slave. A figure-
of-ei5it (an ownership mark in tatu) is represented on the cheek.^

''^^ -^

'^^^

^-i
^

Fig. / niav represent a sandalled foot ; fig. g may possibly repre-
sent a closed hand; but both are doubtful. Figs, h and i possibly
represent a breast and vicmhrum muUehrc respectively, though the

1 Compare the scarified lines still to be seen on the faces of negroes who have
been liberated from slavery within recent years in the Turkish empire.

THE CULTURE OF THE IMHLISTINES 117

former iiiav be ;i Phrvyian cap. The interpretation of these lour
signs is too uncertain to allow us to attach any weight to them.

In figs. J and k we may possible/ see the sacred doves, and in I the
sacred fish. But this cannot be pressed. The ram's head (o),
the hoof (p), the horn (q), and the hide (.s) all indicate a pastoral life.
The symbols f, it, v, re, .r, 7/ are drawn from the plant world, and
it must be noticed that those who developed the script of the Disk
showed an unusual apj)reciation of plant-shapes. It is (juite remark-
able to find such a variety of fioral symbols.

The sign /3 is probably a section of a river, suggestive of water.

The sign b is very remarkable. It is almost certainly a represen-
tation of a domed house, such as is imitated in the Lycian tombs.
It may be the prototype of one of the ' palaces of Ashdod ' ! The
sign C is a pillar with a square capital. The curious sign 0 may
represent some kind of key.

Very important is the ship, fig. rj. It is one more link with the
Medinet Habu sculptures, in which, as we shall see, an identical ship
makes its appearance.

The bow and arrow, figs, k, A, are especially interesting. Reinach
(op. cit. p. 35) ingeniously points out that it is a true picture of the
bow of the Lycian Pandarus, made of two horns of the wild goat
fixed and bound on a piece of wood.

avTLK tcrvXa tu^ov iv^oov, i^dKov atyo?
aypiov . . .

Tov K^pa €K. K€(f)a\rjS (KKatheKabcopa incpvueL'
Kol TO. jjikv aaKi](ras Kepao^oo'i ijpape t^ktcov,
Tiav 5' eS Aeu/yas xpvae-i]v iir^OiiKf Kopojrrjv.

lUud, iv. 10.5-11.

The curved poignard (p) has also Lycian and Carian analogies
(Reinach, op. cit. p. 35). The axe {p.), scjuare (o-), plane (r), signet-ring
(\/^), and leather- cutter's knife {(^), the latter perforated with a hole
in the butt for suspension, all show the specializing of tool> which is
a characteristic of civilization.

Of especial importance is the round shield with bosses (^). It
is not Cretan : the Cretan sliicld is a long oval. But the Sherdanian
warriors at ^ledinet Habu bear the round bossed shield, and Reinach
(oj9. cit. p. 30) figures an Etruscan statuette which bears an identical
protection.

The other signs (-, y, r, x and f) are not sufficiently clear to
identify (r may be an astragalus, used in games, and tt may be an
adze). But enough will have been said to show that quite apart

118

THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

from its literarv value, the Phaestos Disk is of very considerable
importance as a document in the history of Aegean civilization.

(2) AVe now turn to the sculptures on the temple of Medinet Habu.
Here avc have precious illustrations of costumes, vehicles, and arms.

Fig. 7. ^^'agons of the Pulasati.

Fig. 8. Tlic Head-dress of tlie Tulasati.

The Pulasati wear a plumed head-dress, the plumes being fitted
into an elaborately embroidered band enc-ircling the temples, and
secured bv a chin-strap passing in front of the ears. The other tribes
wear similar head-dresses, except the Shekelesh, who have a cap.
The Zakkala are represented as beardless. Their sole body-costume
is the waistband, though some of them seem to have bracelets or
armlets, and bands o)- stra])s crossing the upper part of the body.
The women liavc tlie c]osv-i\ttmgJ'usta7i; the children are naked.

The land contingent travel in wagons, of a scpiare box-like shape,
some witli framed, some with wickerwork sides. They have two
solid wlieels, secured to the axle by a liiuli-pin ; and are drawn

THE CULTURK OF THE IMHLISTINES

119

l''^**"I'l'{

>>*^'^;-

■h-'i-:.?

^^iiia

120 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

by four oxen abreast. The sea-contingent travel in ships which show
a marked resemblance to that of the Phaestos Disk. The keel is
curved (more so at IVIedinet Habu than at Phaestos) and both bow
and stem rise high above the deck, with ornamental finials. A rudder-
oar projects from the stem ; and at Medinet Habu (not at Phaestos)
a mast rises from the middle of the boat, with a yard and a lug-sail.
The ships are fitted with oars, which in the summary Phaestos
hieroglyphic are not shown.

The warriors in the coalition are armed with a sword and with the
long Carian spear ; they have also daggers and javelins for throwing,
and carry circular shields.

A number of enamelled tablets, once forming part of the decoration
of the temple, have been described,^ and these add some further
valuable details. They show prisoners in full co8tume,not the summary
fighting costume. A number of these do not concern us, being Semitic
or North African ; but a Shekelesh, a PhUistine, and one of the
Tur'isha are represented, if Daressy''s identifications are to be accepted.
Unfortunately there is no explanatory inscription with the figures.

The Shekelesh has a yellow-coloured skin, a small pointed beard,
not meeting the lower lip. His hair is combed backward, in a way
remarkably similar to the hair of the woman in the Phaestos disk
(or he wears a crimped head-dress). He is apparelled in a gown, black
with yellow circles above, green below, with vertical folds ; over
this is a waistband divided into coloured squares by bands of green.
On his breast he wears an amulet, in the shape of a ring suspended
round his neck by a cord. A sort of torque [or a chain] surrounds
his neck, and his hands are secured in a handcuff.

The Philistine is more fully bearded: he has likewise a yellow-
coloured skin. The top of the tablet is unfortunately broken, so
onlv the suggestion of the plumed head-dress is to be seen. He wears
a long white robe with short sleeves, quatrefoil ornament embroidered
upon it, and with some lines surrounding the neck ; over this is
a waistband extending from the knees up to the breast, with elaborate
embroidery upon it : a tassel hangs in the middle. Oil the arms are
bracelets. The face of this j)risoner is of a nuich more refined cast
than any of the others.

The supposed Turisha has a red skin : his costume resembles that
of the Philistine, but it is less elaborately embroidered. Three long
ornamental tassels hang from the waistband.

(3) In a country like Palestine, frecjuently jiluudcied and })ossessing

^ Daressy, 'Plaquettes emaillces de Medinet Habu," in pinnules du Service des
Aniiquites de VEyyi^e, vol. xi, p. 49.

THE CUL'l'UllE or TIIK TIIILISTINES 121

a climate that does not permit of the preservation of frescoes and
similar ancient records, we cannot liope to find anything like the rich
documentation that Egypt offers us on tlie suhject of connnerce.
Some suggestive facts may, however, be learnt from finds made in
recent excavations, more especially pottery with coloured decoration.
This will be found described in the section on pottery in my Excavation
ofGezer, vol. ii, pp. 128-241.

Fig. 10. A Bird, as painted on an Amorite and a Philistine \'ase respectively.

Putting aside details, for which I may refer the reader to that
work, it may be said that the periods, into which the history
down to the fall of the Hebrew monarchy is divided, are five in
number ; to these have been given the names pre-Semitic, and First
to Fourth Semitic. The Second Semitic, which I have dated 1800-
1400 «.('., the time which ends in the Tell el-Amarna period, shows
Egyptian and Cypriote influence in its pottery, and here for the first
time painted ornament becomes prominent. The figures are outlined
in broad brush strokes, and the spaces are filled in afterwards, wholly

122 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

or partly, with strokes in another colour. The subjects are animals,
birds, fishes, and geometrical patterns generally, and there can be
little douljt that they fire crude local imitations of models of I^ate
iMinoan ware, directly imported into the country. The Third Semitic,
1400-1000 B.C., includes the time of the Philistine su})remacy : and
though I have dated the beginning of the period rather earlier
than the time of their arrival, the peculiar technique of painted
pottery that distinguishes it need not be dated so early, and may well
have been introduced by them, as it certainly comes to an abrupt end
about the time of their fall. In this there is a degeneration observable
as compared with the best work of the Second Semitic ware. The
designs had in fact become ' hieratic "■, and the fine broad lines in
several colours had given place to thin-line monochrome patterns,
which will be found illustrated in the book referred to.

The Philistines thus, in this particular art, show an inferiority to
their Semitic predecessors. The reason is simple : they were removed
farther in time from the parent designs. But the sudden substitution
of the fine-line techni(|ue of the Third Semitic period for the broad-line
technique of the Second, while the general plan of the designs remains
the same, can be most easily accounted for by the assumption that
the art passed from one rrtce to another. And the sudden disappearance
of the fine-line technique coincides so completely with the subjugation
of the Philistines, that we can hardly hesitate to call painted ware
displaying the peculiar Third Semitic characters ' Philistine \ This
may be a valuable help for future exploration.

The five graves found at Gezer, of which a fully illustrated detailed
description will be found in Excavation of Ge::er, vol. i, pp. 289-300,
were so absolutely different from native Palestinian graves of any
period that imless they were those of Philistines or some other foreign
tribe they would })e inexplicable. They were oblong rectangular
receptacles sunk in the ground and covered with large slabs. Each
contained a single body stretched out (not cr(mched,as in the Canaanite
interments), the head, with one exception, turned to the east. Orna-
ments and food-deposits were placed around. The mouth-plate
found on some of the skeletons was an im})ortant link with Cretan
tradition, and the graves, as a whole, show decided kinship with the
shaft-graves of Knossos or Mycenae, although naturally the art-centre
has shifted to Cyprus, which was the origin of such of the deposits as
had no Egyptian analogies. The bones from these tombs presented
analogies with Cretan bones (see ]). 60 ante) ; but of course five skeletons
are quite insufficient as a basis for anthropological deductions.

^Vith further excavation the debt of Palestinian civilization to the

THE CrLTUUE OF THE rillLISTINES 123

Philistines will proba])lv hv found to 1)e even f^reater than the fore-
going paragraphs would suggest. IJrietly, the impression which the
daily study of objects found in excavation has made on the present
writer is, that from about I^OO-ISOO n.c. onwards to about 800 n.c.
Western Palestine was the scene of a strunjj-le between the Aewan
and Egyptian civilizations, with a slight mingling of Mesopotaniian
influence, and that the local tribes took a merely passive interest in
the conflict and made no contribution whatever to its development.

(4) The Biblical and other literary sources point to the same
conclusion.

Let us take as an illustration the art of Architecture. It is notable
that the only Palestine temples we read about in the Old Testament,
until the building of Solomon''s temple, are the houses of the Philistine
deities.^ Yahweh has a simple tent ; the Canaanite deities have to
be content with their primitive High Places — open areas of ground
with rude pillar-stones. But Gaza, Ashdod, and Beth-Shan have
their temples, and most likely the place called Beth-Car and some of
the Beth-Dagons derived their Semitic names from some conspicuous
temples of gods of the Philistine pantheon.

W^e can deduce something as to the architecture of the Gaza
temple from the account of its destruction by Samson (Judges xvi).
There Mere two groups of spectators — a large crowd (the figure 3000
need not be taken literally) on the roof, and the lords and their
attendants inside. If Samson was also inside, those on the roof
could not have seen him, for no hypaethrum of any probable size
would have allowed any considerable number to enjoy the sport.
Samson must therefore have been outside the temple ; and it follows
that the lords and their attendants must have been, not in an enclosed
naos, but under an open portico. That is to say, the structure must
have been a building of the megaron type. AVhen Samson rested —
just where we should expect, at the edge of the grateful shade of the
portico, where he could the more quickly recover his strength but
would be at a respectful distance from the Philistine notables — he
seized the wooden pillars of the portico, which probably tapered

^ Except the temple at Shcchem (Judges viii. 33— ix. 46\ The events described
as taking place there certainly postulate a covered building. This, however, is
perhaps no real exception : it may have originally been a Philistine structure.
It was dedicated to a certain Baal- or El-Berifh. But 'the Lord of the Covenant'
is a strange name for a local ha'al : can it be that Ihrith is a corruption of BpiTo-
[/xapriy] ? The Book of Judges was probably written about the sixth century it. c. :
by then the temple was most likely a ruin, and the memory of its dedication might
easily have become obscured. The curious expression in Kzekiel, connnented uj)on
on p. 6 ante,, might be similarly explained : by the ordinary canons of criticism the
difficult original reading is to be preferred to the easy emendation there quoted.

124

THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

downwards in the ]\lycenean style. He pnshed them off their base6
by ' bowing himself with all his might**, and, the portico being distyle
and having thus no other support, he brought the whole structure
down. Only a meg-afoii plan will satisfy all the conditions of the story.
Buildings such as this must have been fjimiliar to David in Gath,
and perhaps the sight of them suggested to his mind the idea of
erecting a more worthy temple to his own Deity, as soon as he came
into his kingdom. And when the work was carried out by Solomon,
\\e see that the same model was followed.

< /O -^

..-30 .--■'■■

I o^isthodc

-■20

Fig. 1 1. .Sketcli-plaiis and Kk'vatioiis of tlic Manicioii at ( ia/.a and ofSolotnoii's
Temple (accessory buildings omitted). 'J'lie dimensions of the latter are figured
in cubits : the former is not to scale.

The description in 1 Kings ^ i, ^ ii is not an architect's sjjecification,
and it has numerous technical terms hard to understand. Many
attempts have been made to design a building which should conform
to this account, helped out by the not always trustworthy Josephus.
The nuitual incomjjatibility of these restorations (to say nothing of
their prima facie architectural improbability) is sufficient to deter the
present writer from attempting to add to their number. The main

THE CULTURE OF THE rHH.ISTINES 125

lines of the description are, liowever, clear enough to show witli what
kind of building wc have to deal. We need not attempt to assign
a place to the subsidiary external buildings in three stories, their
winding stairs and other appurtenances, erected against the outside
of the main structure. But we note that the latter was oblonif. 60
cubits long, 30 cubits high, and 20 cubits broad. These figures show
a classical sense o^ prnport'wn for which we look in vain in any ancient
building that excavation has revealed in Palestine. A portico in
front, of the breadth of the house, was 20 cubits broad and 10 cubits
deep. Here again the dimensions are proportioned. The portico
was distyle, like that in the temple of Gaza : the two pillars were
called by names which show that they w^ere not masse both — 'the
stablisher ' and ' strength in it ' are very suitable names for pillars
that have to bear the responsibility of keeping up a heavy portico.
These pillars had shafts 18 cubits long, and capitals 5 cubits high —
a total length of 23 cubits, which leaves, when subtracted from the
height of the building, 7 cubits, a margin that is just about sufficient
for the entablature above and the plinth below. At the opposite end
of the building 'the oracle' or 'the most holy place' corresponds
exactly to the opisthodomos. It was 20 cubits square, which left
a naos, measuring 30 cubits by 20, in the middle of the building : the
'forty cubits ' of 1 Kings vi. 16 evidently includes the portico.

With regard to the ordinary domestic architecture of the Philis-
tines, it must be admitted that the excavations which have been made
in Philistine towns do not lead us to infer that they were on the
whole much better housed than their Semitic neighbours. Amos, it
it true, speaks of the ' palaces' of Gaza and Ashdod (i. 8, iii. 9) ; but
this is rather a favourite word (n"i:)0~ix) of the prophet's, and he finds
' palaces ' in other towns as well. To a rough herdsman many build-
ings would look palatial, which when viewed from another standpoint
would hardly make the same impression.

One of the Philistine tombs at Gezer contained a small knife of iron ;
and this leads us at once to a discussion of fundamental importance.

Inserted into the account of the battle of Michmash there is a very
remarkable passage (1 Sam. xiii. 19-23). It is corrupt, and some
parts of it cannot be translated, but the meaning of it seems to be
something like this : ' Now there Avas no smith found throughout all
the land of Israel, for the Philistines said, " Lest the Hebrews make
them sword or spear." But all the Israelites went down to the
Philistines to sharpen every man his share, and his coulter, and his
axe and his ox-goad (?).' The next verse is too corrupt to translate,
and then the passage proceeds : ' In the day of battle there was neither

126 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

sword nor spear in the hand of any of the people, except with Saul
and Jonathan themselves."'

This is sometimes referred to as a ' disarmament ', but there is no
hint of anything- of the kind. It simply says that the Philistines kept
the monopoly of tlie iron trade in their own hands, and naturally
restricted the sale of weapons of offence to the Hebrews, just as
modern civilized nations have regulations against importing firearms
among subject or backward connnunities. The Hebrews were just
emerging from the bronze age culture. Iron agricultural implements,
which seem slightly to precede iron war-weapons, had been introduced
among them ^ ; but the novelty of iron had not worn off by the time
of Solomon when he built his temple without the profaning touch of
this metal (1 Kings vi. 7) — just as when Joshua made flint knives to
perform the sacred rite of circumcision (Joshua v. 2) ; the old traditions
must be maintained in religious functions. The champions of the
Philistines, of course, were able to use iron freely, although for defensive
purposes thev still use bronze.^

Goliath had a bronze helmet, a bronze cuirass of scale-armour (not
a mail-coat, as in the English translation), bronze greaves, and a bronze
'javelin', but a spear with a great shaft and a heavy head of iron.
The armour of ' Ishbi-benob ' was probably similar, but the text
is corrupt and defective. The armour of Goliath is indeed quite
Homeric, and very un-Semitic. The Kwh] TrciyxaAKOs^, the x'^Xkokv/]-
fMLOes/" and the enormous spear —

(v6' "EiKTOjp ilarj\6( bLiifukos, er 5 apa x^V*-
eyX^o? e'x er8e/cd7r>)x^ * —

are noteworthy in this connexion, especially the greaves, the Hebrew
word for which (nnvo) occurs nowhere else. The Ocopa^ AcTngcoroj
alone would seem post-Homeric, but this is an argumenUim e silentio.
Fragments of a scale-cuirass, in iron, and of a rather later date, were
found in the excavation of Tell Zakariya, overlooking the scene where
the battle is laid {Excavatimis in Palestine, p. 150). But the culture
that Goliath's equij)ment illustrates, like his ordeal by single combat,
is much more European or Aegean than Palestinian.

' See the essay on 'Bronze and Iron' in Andrew Lang's T/ie ^V()l■l(l of Homer,
pp. 96-101..

' An elaborate paper, entitled ' Die Erfinder der Eisentechnik ', by W. Belck, will
be found in Zeilgrhrift fiir JJlIinoloyle (1!H)7), p. 831-. It claims the Philistines as the
original inventors of the smith's art. That is, perhaps, going a little too far.

^ Greaves a{)pear to be unknown in Oriental or Egyptian warfare. See Darem-
berg and Saglio, Did. des antt. yr. el rum., s.v. Ocrea.

* Jl. vi. :ji8.

THE CULTURE OF THE PHILISTINES 127

In the report of Wen- Anion we found that the Zakkala were busy
in the Phoenician ports, and had large influence in Phoenicia. The
representations of Phoenician ships, such as the sadly damaged fresco
which W. Max Mi'iller has published,^ shows them to have heen
identical in type with the ships of the Pulasati. It is highly probable
that further research will show that it was due to the influence of
the 'Peoples of the Sea' that the Phoenicians were induced to take
to their very un-Semitic seafaring life. And it is also probable that
it was due to Zakkala influence that the same people abandoned the
practice of circinncision, as Herodotus says they did when they had
commerce with ' Greeks '. ^

An interesting question now arises. Was it to the Philistines and
their kinsmen that the civilized world owes the alphabet ? The
facts that suggest this query may be briefly stated. For countless
generations the Egyptians, the Babylonians, and probably the Hittites,
had been lumbering away with their complex syllabaries ; scripts as
difficult to learn and to use as is the Chinese of to-day. As in
China, the complexity of the scripts was a bar to the diffusion
of learning : the arts of reading and writing were perforce in the
hand of specially trained guilds of scribes. No one thought of the
possibility of simplifying the complexities ; while current ' hieratic '
forms of the letters might come into being with hasty writing, all
the elaborate machinery of syllables and ideograms and determinatives
was retained without essential modification.

Suddenly we find that a little nation in Syria appears to have
hit upon a series of twenty-two easily- Avritten signs by which the
whole complex system of the sounds of their language can be expressed
with sufficient clearness. If it was really the Phoenicians, of all
people, who performed this feat of analysis, it was one of the most
stupendous miracles in the history of the world. That the Phoenicians
ever originated the alphabet, or anything else, becomes more and more
impossible to believe with every advance of knowledge.

The alphabet makes its appearance soon after the movements of
the 'sea-peoples'. Zakar-Baal is found keeping his accounts, not
on clay tablets (and therefore not in cuneiform) but on papyrus,
which he imports from Egypt in large quantities. And we are
tempted to ask if the characters he used were some early form of
the signs of the so-called ' Phoenician ' alphabet.

The oldest specimen of this alphabet yet found has come to
light in Cyprus : the next oldest is the far-famed Moabite Stone.

» Mitth. der vorderas. Gesell. (1904), 2, plate iii. » II. 104.

128 THE SCHWEICH LECTURES, 1911

W. Max Miiller^ cleverly infers from some peculiarities in the
rendering of names in the list of Sheshonk's captured towns, that
the scribe of that document was working from a catalogue in which
the names were written in the Phoenician alphabet. This would
bring the use of this alphabet in Palestine back to about 930 b. c,
or about a century earlier than the Moabite Stone. A letter in
neo-Babylonian cuneiform, probably not much earlier than this, and
certainly of local origin, was found at Gezer : the date of the
introduction of the Phoenician alphabet is thus narrowed down
very closely.

Whence came the signs of this alphabet ? De Rouge's theory,
which deri\ L'd them from Egyptian hieratic, was the most reasonable
of any, but no longer commands favour. There was for long a script
of linear signs, strangely resembling the Phoenician alphabet, in use
in Crete. It must be admitted, however, that so far no very satis-
factory analogies have been drawn between them, though their
comparison is not without promise of future fruit.

But in this connexion the Phaestos Disk once more seems to assume
importance. We are inclined to ask if it is possible that in the
script of which this document is so far the sole representative, we
are to see the long-sought origin ? It is not unreasonable to suppose
that in process of time the script of the Disk would become simplified
into just such a linear script as that alphabet : and the principle of
elision of the terminal vowel of syllables, already noticed in analysing
the inscription on the Disk, is just what is wanted to help the process
of evolution over that last most difficult fence, which divides a
syllabary from a pure alphabet. Suppose that three syllables, lea,
A:o, leu, represented each by a special symbol, lost their vowel under
certain granmiatical or euphonic conditions ; then all three being
simply pronounced A' might in writing become confused, leading
ultimately to the choice of one of the syllabic signs to denote the
letter k. Thus an alphabet of consonants would develop, which is
just what we have in the Phoenician alphabet. The 45 ^-x characters
of the original script — for we have no guarantee that we have all the
characters of the script represented on the disk — could very easily
wear down by some such process as this to the twenty-two signs of
the Phoenician alphabet.

As to the forms of the letters, in the total absence of intermediate
links, and our total ignorance of the phonetic value of the Phaestos
signs, it would be premature to institute any elaborate comparisons
between the two scripts. The Phaestos Disk is dated not later than

^ Anien uml IJurojui, ]). 171.

THE CUi;rUllK OF rilK PIIILISTINKS 1*29

1600 n. ('., the Phoenician alpliabet c-aniiot he trat-ed even so far back
as about 1000 u.c., and what may have happened in the intervening-
six hundred years we do not know. But some arrestin<^ comparisons
are already possible. The symbol wliicli I have called (h) miirht well
in rapid writing develop into the Plioenician si<^n (ileph. The little
man running (a) is not unlike some forms of trsade. The head (e)
both in name and shape reminds us of rcsh. The dotted triangle (i)
recalls daleth or tcth, the fish (1) in name and to some extent in shape
suggests ?iun — it is notable that the fish on the Disk always stands
upright on its tail — the five-leaved sprig (w) is something like
.mmeJch, the water-sign (13) might be mem (the three teeth of the
rhocnician letter preserving tlie three lines of the original sign).
The manacles (z) resembles beth, the nail-pillar or prop (Q resembles
vav in both shape and meaning, the remarkable key (6) simplifies
into rsaijin, the square {a) into gimel, and the object (tt) whatever
it may be, into pe. These tentative equivalents have been added for
comparison to the table of characters on p. 116. The direction of
writing is from right to left in each case.

The plumed head-dress, so conspicuous as a sign on the Disk,
connects it witli the Philistines : and the evidence afforded us by
the Golenischeff papyrus of the Syrian colonies of Philistines, or of
their near kinsmen the Zakkala, links it with the I'hoenicians. How
far it may be possible to make farther comparisons, with the various
scripts of Crete, Cyprus, and Asia Minor, are cjuestions which must
be left for future discoveries and for special research.

We are not here writing a history of the alphabet : but one or
two points may be noticed which have a bearing on the subject.
It is commonly assumed that because the names of the letters have
a meaning in Semitic, and no meaning in Greek, therefore they are
Semitic words adapted into Greek. This is, however, a 7wn sequHur}
It would be more probable that the horrozcing nation should cast
about for words similar in sound, and possessing a meaning Avhich
would make the names of the letters easily remembered. Such an
attempt would be sure to be unsuccessful in some cases : and in })oint
of fact there are several letter-names in the Semitic alphabet to which
the tortures of the Incjuisition have to be applied before a meaning
can be extracted from them through Semitic. It may thus be that
all the letter-names are a heritage from some pre-Hellenic, non-
Semitic language : and instead of the old idea of a Phoenician
Ur-Alphabet from which all the South Semitic, North African, AWst

' See M. Rene Dussaud's paper ' L'Origine egeenne des alphabets scniitiqucs'
in Journal asiatique, Ser. X, vol. v, p. 3,!>7.

130 THE SCIIWEICH LECTURES, 1911

Asian, Ilellenic, and Italic alphabetic scn})ts are derived, we are to
picture a number of parallel and nearly related alphabets developing
out of one of the hieroglyphic syllabaries of the Aegean basin — one
of which scripts was taught to the Phoenicians by the despised
Philistines. "Whoever invented the alphabet laid the foundation-
stone of civilization. Can it be that we owe this gift to the
Philistines, of all people?

And even this is not all. The rude tribes of Israel were
i'orced to wage a long and stubborn fight with the Philistines for
the possession of the Promised Eand. For long it seemed
doubtful whether Canaan would be retained by the Semitic tribes
or lost to them : and it is no mere accident that the best-known
name of the country is derived from that of the sea-rovers. In the
struggle the Hebrews learned the lessons of culture which they needed
for their own advancement : and what was more important, they
learned their own essential unity. The pressure of external opposition
welded, as nothing else could have done, their loosely-knitted clans into
a nation. This was the historic function of the Philistines ; they
accomplished their task, and then vanished with startling suddenness
h"om the stage. But the Chosen People were led on from strength to
strength, till they too fulfilled their mission of teaching mankind
to look forward to a time when the knowledge of the Lord should
cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.

Thus the influence of the Philistines remains, even if indirectly,
a heritage of huniiinity to the end of time.

INDEX

Abarbanel, 100.

Abimek'ch, 38, 81.

Abi-Milki, 19.

Abi-abam, 38.

Achaeans, 25.

Achish, 51, 52, 60, 02, 65, 72, 81.

Adullaiii, 53.

Agenor, 97.

Ahaz, Philistine revolt under, 03.

Ahimilki, 65.

Ahimiti, 64.

Ahuzzath. 81.

Aijalon, 03.

Akasou, 10, 11, 20 {see also Achisli\

'Akir, 74.

AlaSia, 8, 19.

Alcaeus, 26.

Aldemios, 107.

Aldioma, 107.

dWopvKot, 2.

Alphabet, origin of, 127.

Alton, 13, IS, 83, 105, 113.

Amos, 125 (see also undtr Scnptui'al

Passages).
Anakim, CO, 68.
Anath, 41.
Anchises, 81.
Antipater of Tarsus, 97.
Antoninus Liberalis, 97.
Aphek, 46.

Aphrodite, statue of, at Gaza, 108.
Architecture, Philistine influence on,

123
Ark, the, 47, 76, 91.
Armour of Goliath, 54, 120.
Arnold, 3.

Aryans, Philistines jjrobablv not, 13.
Ashdod, 47, 60, 63, 64, 65, 71, 72,81, 100,

106.

— history and site of, 73.

— palaces of, 117.

— siege of, 66, 73.

— speech of, 66.

— temple at, 47.
Ashdodimmu, 64, 73.
Asher, tribe of, 69.
Ashkelon, 37, 40, 95, 97.

— coins of, 112.

— history and site of, 71.
Ashtoreth, Ashtaroth, 93.

— temple of, 52, 91.
Asi, 7, 8.

'Ad/fAj^TTios AeorToCxoS) 115.
Assyrian annals, Philistines in, 63 sqq.
Astarte, 95 (see also Ashtoretli).
Aswan, Jewish colony at, 11, 41.

Atar, Ate, 95.

Atargatis, 95-97, 99.

Athenaeus, 97,

'Avvim, 5, 68.

Azuri (king of Ashdod), 64.

Azuri (city captured by Sennaclierib),

64.
'AfwTtojj 66.

Baal-Berith, 123.

Baal-Perazim, 53, 54, 58.

Baal-zebub, 91.

Badyra, 30, 81.

Baethgen, 95.

Bauer, 74.

Baur, 27.

Beech er, 13.

Beit Dejan, 70 see also Beth-Dagon),

Belck, 126.

Bene-Berak. 04.

Benesasira, 10, 44.

Benjamin of Tudela, 72.

Berossos, 104.

Br^Taywv, 106 {see also Beth-Dagon\

Beth -Car, 27, 48, 49, 93.

Betli-Dagon, 42. 04, 09, 103.

Beth-Shan, 52, 91, 93.

Beth-Shemesh, 48, 03, 76.

Birch, 82.

Body-guard of Hebrew kings, Philistine,

61.
Bones of Philistines, 60.
Boylan, 105.
Breasted, 19, 20, 21, 29.
Britomartis, 96, 97, 9«, 99, 123.
'Bpvrov, BfjvTos, 97.
Burrows, 15.
Byblos, 8, 30 sq., 30.

Callimaehus, 96.

Callinus, 28.

Calmet, 11.

Can opus, decree of, 11.

Caphtor, Caphtorim, 4, 5, 11, 12, 13, 27.

Cappadocia, 11, 12.

Carians, Carites, 7, 25, 20, (51.

Car])atlios, 27.

Casluhim, 4, 5, 12, 28.

Caunus, 26.

Chariots, 40, 43.

Chassinat, 81.

Cherethites, 5, 61, 88, 89.

Cicero, 105.

Cilicia, Cilicians, 12, 25.

Circumcision, 21, 39, 46.

132

INDEX

Clermont-Giiiuuau. 28, yfi, 75, 94.

Clusiuni, 88.

C'olcniaii.s, 12.

Conway, 82.

Coinilf, 6.

Crest, Carian, 26.

Crete, Cretans, G, 9, 10, 13.

— messengers fi-om, to Egypt. 8.
Cyprus, 8, 35, 122.

Daedalus, 90.

Dagon, Dagan, 4G, 81, 99, 104.

— image of, 100.

— names compounded with, 103. 104.

— temples of, (>7, 73, 90, 91, 99.
Dagon, a place 1)y Jericho, ()9 (see also

Beth-Dagon).
Aaxaprjvoij 28.
Damascius, 104, 112.
Dan, tribe of, 38, 69.
Danaoi, 25.

Danuna, Danunu. 19, 22, 24, 2o.
Dardanu, 19. 25.
Daressy, 120.

Deborah, sunn of, 38, 40, 41, 90.
Dciredh-Dhul)l)an. 77.
Delilah, 55, 61, 81, 87.
Delos, inscription at. 94.
Delta, 12.

Democratic instincts of Philistines, 88.
Derketo, 95, 98.
De Kou£je, 128.
Do Saufcy, 114.
Dhikerin, 75.
Dictynna, 96, 98. 99.
Diodorus Siculus, 95. '.)('>. 99.
Dodecapylon, 111.

Dome of the Rock, Jonisakni. 111. 112.
Dor, 30, 36, 69.
Dus'saud, 129.

Ehen-Ezer. 47.

Ehers, 12, 14, 83.

Ekron, 40, 47, 62, 64. (\r,. 71,91.

— history' and site of, 74.
p]kron-Saphoiiah. 74.
Ekwesh, 20. 21, 25.
Elhanan, 55.

Eli, 46.

El-Tekeh, 13, C.l. 7(;.

Ephes-Damniini, 5ii, 51, 57.

Epiphanius of Coiistaiitia. 1 13.

Erman, 29.

J'.'sar-haddon, (55.

Eshmunazar, 102.

Etruscans, 1.3, 82, 88, 89, 91, 105, 117.

Europa, 97,

Evans, 15.

Ewald, 6.

Fenish, 67.
Festivals, 90.
Festus, 105.
Fish, saii'ed, 95.

— avoided by Syrians, 97.
Fourmont, 2.

Frazer, 28.

Gath, 47, 51, 54, 60, 71, 89.

— history and site of, 72.
Gatis, 97.

Gaza, 40, 60, 65-67, 71, 100, 106.

— coins of, 15, 112.

— history and site of, 71.

— temples of, lOS.
Fa^aioi, <>•).

Geba, 49, 53, 54, 56, 58.

Gederoth, 63.

George, St., and the Dragon, 98.

Gesenius, 2.

Gezer, 56, 59, 62. 122.

Gibbethon, 62.

Gibeah of God, 49.

Gibeon, 54.

Gilboa, 52.

Gimzo, 63.

Gob, 55, 56.

Golenischeff Papyrus, 24, 29 (see also
Wen -Anion),

Goliath, 50, 54, 60, 61, 81, 126.

Governors, Philistine, in Hebrew terri-
tory, 49, 88.

Goylm, 43.

Greaves, 126,

Habiru. 18.

Hadad-Nirari III cinquers the Philis-
tines, ()3.

Hadrian, 111.

Hall, H. R,, 5, 7, 8, 16, 27, IKJ.

Hanunu, king of Gaza, (53.

Harosheth, 42.

Harris Papyrus, 23.

Hazael. 62.

Head-dress of Philistines, 83, 87 (ste
rt?so Crest).

Hebrews in Philistine service, 52.

Herodotus, 6, 12, 26, 47, 65, 66. 73. 94.
127.

Hesychius, 96.

Hezekiah, 63, Hi.

Hiei'apolis, 95.

Hittites, 18,

Hitzig, 2, 12. 81.

Ilrihor, 29.

Hrozny, 104, lo5.

Human sacrilice, 91, lo'.i, 110.

Hunger, 92.

lamblichus, 92.

Ikasamsu. 81.

Ikausu, <)5. 81.

Ikhnaton, 18, l'.>.

Images used as aniuUts, Dl.

Insanit\', Semitic attitude towards, 51.

Iron, introduction of, 125.

Isaac, 38.

Ish-baal or Ish-boshclli. 52.

Ishbi-benolj, 55, 60.

Ittai, 61, 81.

Jabin. 42.

INDKX

135

Jiibiibii, (;;>. I

Johorani, Philistine revolt under, (>], Ol*.
Jehoshaphat, Philistines tributaries to,

62.
Jensen, lot.
Jerome, 1)9, lOo, 113.
Jest, Egyptian, 34.
Jonah, 1)8.

Jonathan Maccabaeus, ()7.
Jonathan, son of Shiniei, 57.
Joppa, Hi.

Josephus, 1, 12, (>1), 71), 92, 100, lUO, 124.
Justin, 37.

Kadesh, 66.

Kadytis, 65.

Kalt, 44.

Kaniphausen, 5:t.

Karnak, temple of, S, 20.

Kasios Mountain, 12.

Kanata, inscription at, 113.

Keftiu, 7-11, 14.

Keilah, 51, 57.

Kelekesh, 19, 24. 25,

Kimhi, David, loO, lol.

Kingship, Hebrew, foundation of, 49.

Kiriath-Jearim, 48.

KirkmicJiael, hulj- well at, 93.

Knobel, 12.

Knossos, 9, 10, 18, 122.

Knudtzon, 19, 103.

Kcihler, 12.

Kom Ombo, 4, 11.

Lagarde, 100.

Lakemacher, 6.

Lampridius, 113.

Land of Philistines, borders of, 68.

— physical character of, 78.
Lang, 126.

Language, 50, 79.

Leaping over threshold, 62 i^ste «te"

Threshold).
Leleges, 26.
Lenormant, 92.
Levi, Eabbi, 100.
Libnah, 62.
Libyans, 20, 21.
Lords of Philistines, 46, 87.
Lucian, 95, 97, 98.
Lucumones, 88.
Lukku, 19, 20, 25.
Lycians, 25,

— their tombs, 117.
Lydia, 25,

Maeonia, 25.

Magical formula in Kel'tiaii lanuuage,

83.
Maiouma, 71.
Makamaru, 30, 81,
Manoah, 4<).
Maoch, 81.

Marcus the Deacon, 91, 106.
Marinus, 113.
Marna, 2, 15, 71. 91. 106. 107, 118.

Ma melon, 107 sqq., 124.

Masa, 19, 24.

Mawuna, 19, 24, 25.

Mediiiet Ilabu, 12, 21, 23, 26, 68, 90. 103,

117, 118.
Menkheperuseneb, tomb of, 8, 9,
Mermaid form of deity, 98, 100,
Merneptali, 20, 69,
Metheg ha-ammah, 60.
Meyer E.), 76,
Meyer M. A. , 66.
Michmash, battle of, 49, 50.
Military equipment of Philistine-. 90.
Minet el-Kal'ah, 74.
Minoa, 15.

Minoan Periods, 15 sqq.
Minos, 26, 46, 96.
Mitinti, king of Ashkelon, 65. ()8.
Mnaseus, 97,
Moabite stone, 128.
Moore, 40, 41.
Movers, 2.
Muller, W. Max, 8, 9. lo. 12, 14, 21, 28,

29, 58, 81, 103, 127.
Mysia, 25,

Necho, 65.

Nehemiah, 66.

Nesubenel)ded. 29.

Neubauer, 75, 10".

Nisus, 46,

Nob, 51.

Noordtzij, 12, 39, 66, 80,

Oannes, 104.

Obed-Edoni, 61.

Odakon, 104.

Ophiussa, 27.

Oracle at Ekroii, 62, 91, 106.

Oscans, 25.

Padi, 64, 65.
Pamphylia, 25.
Pantheon, 111, 112.
Paton, 104.
Pausanias, 96, 105.
Pedasus, 25.
Pelasgians, 2, 12, 2().
Pelethites, 6, 61.
Peoples of the sea, IS s(|q.
Perseus, 98.
Pet-auset, statue of, 82.
Petrie, 21, 27.
Phaestos, 16.

— Disk, 26, 83 s(iq., 106. 115.
Phicol, 81.

I'hilistia in the time of Abraham, 39.

— fertility of, 62, 114.
Philistine, the name, 1, 2,

— language, 43.
Philitis, Philition, 6, 12.
Philo, 102, 103.
Phoenicians, 11.

— Philistine influence on, 69. 127.
Pidasa, 19, 24, 25.

Pisidia, 25,

134

INDEX

Pliny, 92.
Porpliyrius, 100.
Pottery, Pliilistine, 121.
Praesos inscriptions, 43, 82.
Priests, Philistine, 100.
Prophetic denunciations of Philistines,
70.

— Ecstasy, fits of, 32, 10'.».
Psammetichns, 06.
Piilasati, Purn-atu. 22, 24. 2o.

QuatreniLn-. 12.

Ramessn II. lU.

— Ill, 21, 22. 3r,.

— VI, U.

— IX, 34.

— Xli, 2<».
Raplia, <)0.
Rcdslob, 3.

Reinach (A. J.), 3t). 115, 117.

Rekhniara, tomb of, 8, '.), 11. 12.

Renan, 80.

Rephaites, Rei)haim, (>0, 68.

Rephaim, Philistine camp at, 58.

Rhinoeolura, 68.

Rhodes, 27.

Rib-Addi, lU, 25.

River of Eiij'pt, 68.

Rost, 63.

Rukipti, king of Ashkelon. 63.

Sagalassus, 25.

Samson, 38, 44, 87, 100.

Samuel, 47, 41).

Sardinians, 25.

Sardis, 25.

Sargon, 64.

Sarludari, 64.

Saph, 55, 8 1 .

Saul, 40 sqq.

Sayce, 4.

Schliemanii, 15.

School exercise-tablet, Hieratic, Hi, 44.

82.
Schradei-. 63.
Schwally, 13.
Scylax, 37.
Scylla, 46.
Sea-monsters, 1)8.
Selden, 1)7.
Semiramis, 1)9.
Sen-mut, tomt> of, 8.
Sennacherit), 64. 104.
S«pp, 73.
Serapis, 113.

Seren, 43, 79, 87 (see also Lord^ .
Shamgar, 41.

Shammah the Hararite, 42, 57.
Slioclieni, tenifile at, 123.
Shekele^sh, 20, 22, 24, 25.
Slion, 52.

Sherdanu, 19, 20, 22, 24.
Sheshoiik. .59.
Shihor, 68.
Shifoh, 76.

Sliips, 117, 120, 127.

Shocho, 63.

Sliunammite sojourns among Philistines,

62.
Sibbecai, 55.
Sidon, 33, 37.
Si sera, 42, 62, 81.
Skinner, 4.
Slave-trade. 71, 114.
Smith i^G. A.\ 114.
Smith (H. P.), 47.
Solinus, 96.
Soothsaying, 91.
Sorek, valley of, 45.
Speech of Ashdod, 73.
Spiegelberg, 10.
Stade. 13.
Stark, 12.
Stephanus of Byzantium, 15, 28, 72, 97,

100,
Strabo, 2t>, 27, 28, 66.
Sutu, 18.

Symbolic initial of Marna, 112.
Syntax of names in Hebrew, 3.

Table of nations, 1, 4, 28.

Tacitus, 15.

Tages, 105.

Tarsus, 25.

Tell el-Amarna, 19.

Tell es-Safi, 56, 72.

Tell Zakariya, 126.

Temple, Solomon's, 124.

Temples, Philistine, 123.

Tent-Amon, 29.

Teucrians, 28.

Thargelia, 91.

Thera, 18.

Threshold, rites connected with, 102,

111.
Thutmose III, 7-9,
Tiele, 13.

Tiglath-Pileser III, 03.
Timnath, 63.
Tobit, 104.
Toy, 6.

Traditions, modern, of Philistines, 67.
Trees, sacred, 58.

Tribal subdivisions of I'hilistines, 88.
Troas, 24.
Trumbull, 102.
Turisha, 20, 24.
Tyrrhenians, 24.

Urania, 94, 95.
Uzziah, 62, 72,

Virey, 8.

Warati, 30, 81.
Washasha, 22, 25, 27.
Waddington, 113.
Wady el-Arisli, 08.
Weill, 25, 27, 2S.
Wellhausen, 101.
Wen-Amon, 29,69, 81, 127.

INDEX

135

Wilkinson, S.

Winckler, l'.», 52, <»:.', 04. 10.;.

Wredomann, 14.

Xanthus, 07.

Yamani, (»4,
Yaruna, 10, L'4.

Zaggi, 81.

Zakar-Baal, 30, 127.

Zakkala, 22, 24, 25. :$(», (js, (10.

Zakro, 27.

Zcrnukah, 7(j.

Ztiiy OLTToixvios, 02.

— Ciireos, 20, 27.

Zibel, king of Ga/,a. <).'>.

Zidka, C4.

Ziklag, 1:5, 51, 52, CI. 71, 81. SO.

Ziph, 51.

136*

INDEX OF SCRIPTURAL REFERENCES

( W'ltni flic Kiiy/ish miDienifioii of rersr.s dijfi'r.s J'rniH the HrhiTir, t hi' former

!.\- hrri- fu/o/ifci/. )

Genesis x. (>, 1:J, 14 : 4, 28.

xii. 6 : :5.

xii. 10-20 : 38.

XV. IG : o.

XX. 1-18 : 38.

xxi 22-34 : 38, 39.

xxvi. 1-23 : 38, 39, 88.
Exodus xiii. 17 : 39.

XV. 14 : 39.

xxxiii. 31 : 40.
Deuteronomy ii. 23: •"). 11,

68.
Joshua V. 2 : 126.

xi. 21 : 60. 68.

xii. 23 : 43.

xiii. 1-3: 4,40,43,68,74.

xiii. 4 : 5.

XV. 11 : 74.

xvii. 16 : 43.

xix. 27 : 69.

xix. 40 : 76.

xix. 43: 74.
Judges i. 18, 19 : 40, 48, 89,
90,

Hi. 3: 40, 79.

iii. 31 : 41.

V. 6 : 41.

viii. 33 -ix. 46 : 123.

X. 6, 7, 11 : 2, 44, KC.

xiii. 1,5: 2.

xiv. 2 : 2.

xvi. 23-31: 41, 90, 123.

xviii. 2 : 38.
1 Samuel iv : 46.

V. 1-5 ; 62, 89, 100.

vi. 18 : 89.

vii : 48.

vii. 11, 12 : 4,27, 47, .->2.

ix. 16 : 49.

X. 5 : 49.

xiii. 5 : 90.

xiii. 19-23 : 4, 125.

xiv. 3 : 48. 76.

xvi. 14-18 : 57.

xvi. 21 : 54.

xvii : 54, «().

xvii. 51-51 : 4. 7-5.

1 Samuel xviii. 1 : 57.
xviii. 30 : 89.

xix. 7 : 57.
XX vii. 2 : 88.
xxvii. 5 : 89.
xxix. 2 : 90.
XX ix. 3, 9 : 89.
XXX. 14 : 5, 89.
xxxi. 9 : 91.

2 Samuel v. 2 : 57.
V. 17-21 : 4, 53.
v. 21 : 91.

V. 22-25 : 53.
viii. 1 : 53.
xviii. 3 : 55.
XX. 23 : 7.
xxi. 12, 17 : 4, 55.
xxi. 18, 19 : 56.
x.Ki. 22 : <>0.
xxiii. 9 : 57.
xxiii. 11: 42.

1 Kings ii. 39 : 60.
iv. 19 : 49.

iv. 21 : 88.
vi, vii : 124.
vi. 7 : 12().
vii. 30 : 80.
ix. 16: .59.
xiv. 25 : 59.

2 Kings i. 2 : 77, 91.
xi. 4. 19 : 7.

xii. 18 : 63.

xviii. 8 : 63. 71, 89.

xviii. 14 : 64.

1 Chronicles iv. 19 : 45.
vii. 12 : 6.

xi. 13 : 4. 42, 57.
xiv. 8 12: 1. 54.
xiv. 1316: 54.
xviii. 1 : 54,
XX. 4 : 56.

2 Chronicles xi. 8 : 7.3.
xxi. K; : 4.

xxvi. 14 : 80.

xxviii. 18: 6.3.
Rzra ii. 53: 62.
.Vuliemiali iv. 7 : 66.

Neliemiali vii. 55 : 62.

xiii. 2.3. 24 : M.
Psalm XXX iv. title : 38.

Is.. 8-12 : 61.

Ixxxiii : 66.

Ixxxiii. 9 : 42.

Ixxxvii. : 70.

cviii. 7-10 : (U.
Isaiah ii. <> : 91.

ix. 1 : 43.

ix. 12: 2,6:5.

X. .32 : 51.

XX. 1 : 64.

xxviii. 21 : 54.

xlvi, 1 : 99.
Jeremiah vii. 14 : 76.

XXV. 20 : 73, 88.

xlvii. 1 : 65.

xlvii. 4 : 5. 11.
Ezekiel xvi. 27 : 70.

xxiii. 24 : 80.

XXV. 16 : 6. 88.

XXX. 5: 6, 123.

xliv. 7 : 61.
Joel iii. 4 : 43.
Amos i. <> : 71.

i.8: 73. 88, 125.

iii. 9 : 7:!, 125.

vi. 2 : 73

ix 7 : I, 5, 11, 13.
Micali I. 10 : 72.
Zephaniah i. 8, 9 : 62. 102.

ii. 4 : 69, 74^

ii. 5 : 6.

ii. 6 : 13.
Zecliariali ix. 5 : 88.

ix. 7: 70.
Ecclcsiasticus 1. 26 : 70.

1 Maccabees v. <)8 : 7.3.

X. 83, 84: 47,67,73, 106.
xi. 4 : 67.
xiv. 34 : 89,
xvi. 15 : 69.

2 Maccabot's xii. 40 : 91,
Matthew xii. 24 : 91.
.lulm viii. (» : .^1.

•T^,1

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